- Don’t be pissed. You the one sentient being in a family of NPCs (no offence).
I always microwave my ice-cream.
People freak out when I tell them I do this.
Another thing people freak out about is when I tell them I sprinkle instant coffee on supermarket bought vanilla ice cream. The (too) sweet ice cream balances with the bitter coffee and it adds a textural element.
- "May"
- > And with all of this money being injected into the economy, we are absolutely going to get an enormous amount of inflation... eventually. You could see it as already happening with the valuation of the stock market.
To be fair when I read this I assumed you took issue with the actions of both the government and the fed since both were injecting money into the economy. The invocation of Section 13(3) of the Federal Reserve Act also blurred the line between the actions of Government and the fed.
Still I find it odd that you would attribute the inflation solely to the money that was injected into the economy via senate bills but ignore the trillions the fed was injecting into the economy and supply chain disruptions or rising energy costs due to the war in Ukraine.
- So with your 20/20 vision and your ability to see into the future what was the exact dollar amount at the time that you thought should be enough to stop a total meltdown of the US economy? Using logic and reason how did you come to the exact dollar amount that would emotionally appease investors and business providing them with enough "investor confidence"?
The timescale you are looking at is very small. The federal reserve has a dual mandate to have maximum employment and stable prices. What would have happened on a longer timeframe to employment and prices if every other country effectively backstopped their economy but the USA didn't?
It's like you don't know why the fed even came to exist or have any knowledge about the great depression or just fail to recognize how catastrophic that the pandemic was to the USA economy or the world economy as a whole.
- By all means after fact have an enquiry into the response and how it could have been better but don't do that without first acknowledging the uncertainty that was present at the time.
- Not so much hindsight as "what I've been saying all along".
It was a dynamic situation and it sounds like the only things that you were optimizing for in your mind was inflation and covid deaths whiles ignoring second order effects and data that likely wasn't available to the public.
You are like a person who kept telling everyone it was 12:00am but it wasn't, then when it finally became 12:00am and everyone agreed you jumped up and said "See guys it's 12:00am why didn't anyone listen to me! I was right all along!".
It's a bit rich to blame all the inflation on the financial response to the pandemic without taking into consideration the effect the pandemic had on logistics or considering what would have happened if the government didn't spend enough. Also it's probably worth mentioning that the Fed operates independently and is tasked with only financial functions.
> The science was out in the open in papers and government statistics for anyone with scientific training to read. Politicians were caving to polarized public opinions on both sides to take advantage of and encourage their chosen pole.
No argument here except to say it's one thing to know the science and it's another thing to act on the science.
> Those of us talking about moderation and common sense reactions were demonize by one side or usually both depending on the venue. Nobody in leadership had the balls to lead and try to make people understand a middle path based on reason.
If there is one thing I know it's that common sense only exists when people share the same values and assumptions. Why for example was it acceptable to you that 1 out of 1000 people died of covid? Why not more? Why not less?
- Everything is easier in hindsight isn't it? Especially with such a complex problem.
> The COVID restrictions needed to be less and end sooner
What would we have been optimizing for here? GDP? Deaths? ICU Capacity? Lifestyle? Or would we weight them? If so would we take 2nd and 3rd order effects into consideration?
> An example graph, when restrictions should have been on or off left as an exercise to the reader
I lived in a country/state that did this during the pandemic. It wasn't a case of restrictions on, restrictions off. It was more a dialing back or ramping up of restrictions. If you look at other countries that did this you will still find the wave pattern. If I had to guess that is related to immunity after exposure. What would change however is the height of the peaks. With it's political/media landscape I don't know if the approach you suggest could have been applied effectively in the USA. Ultimately what drives cases/deaths is human behavior and the virus itself. Those who thought covid was an issue were taking precautions regardless of the restrictions.
> The disease didn't go away, we just at one point decided we were done with restrictions even though conditions didn't change.
This is a gross simplification of the whole pandemic. If I was to narrativize it I would say that over time as exposure to the virus increased it became less deadly so the vast majority of the people who were already prone to dying via covid had done so already.
> The problem is it became a non-expert political issue where people who knew meme-facts based on their social bubble only really argued absolutist policies against stone wall opposition.
This is more a comment on the political/media landscape than the response to covid itself. People have to operate within the system. If they present any sort of nuanced idea then they are persecuted by roughly 50% of the population whose narrative it infringes upon.
> We needed people in a minmax mode arguing about specific levels of risk vs reward to set optimums, instead you had 0 risk folks screaming at 0 restriction folks screaming back with the middle entirely excluded. (We'll STILL get people on both sides responding here)
The WHO was very clear at the beginning of the pandemic about the risks of the virus. For wealthy countries whose hospitals were "lean and mean" a high number of cases would cause immense pressure on these hospitals resulting in otherwise avoidable deaths not just from covid but from other things that would result from a limited ICU capacity. By this I mean life saving operations getting cancelled because there was no capacity in the ICU. It's also worth mentioning the restrictions pared with the financial aid allowed people to stay at home and not engage in any risk taking activities.
To summarize I think it's easy to arm chair quarterback the response to the pandemic. It's like most of politics. We sit here watching what is effectively a shadow puppet show but are left clueless to what is really going on because if we did know we can't be trusted with the secrets, or wouldn't be able to understand the data, or would object to a course of action as an emotional response, even if what is presented is truthful and the most optimal solution to a problem. The "masks are ineffective" narrative at the beginning of the pandemic was a classic example of this.
- I thought so. I saw it a while ago when I re-working my network but didn't get it because I have 2TB of data on my phone that I can connect to my router should my internet go down. It's only a 250Mbps(down)/40Mbps(up) connection but that will do for a couple of days or so.
- It's the efficiency of capitalism at work.
It's more efficient to allocate capital to systems and processes that delay or stop you claiming on your insurance than it is to actually pay out a genuine claim.
- Starlink has a specific backup plan too don't they?
- The way things are going no one will be able to afford a PC.
Instead we will be streaming games from our locked down tablets and paying a monthly subscription for the pleasure.
- Bingo!
Some will argue that consumption drives production but according to the common definition children don’t contribute to GDP.
Assuming governments are going to address population growth/decline then it’s a choice between incentivising births or issuing visas.
Even in countries that have free healthcare births are in decline so it’s not the cost of children alone that is causing this situation. I would argue it’s the economic crutch called immigration.
- So who adds more to GDP:
A. A child of any age.
OR
B. A migrant worker.
My guess is B because that person can produce goods for export while consuming local goods. Children (at least for the first few years of their life or so) do not contribute to production. They only contribute towards consumption. You could argue that they motivate the parents to produce more but increasing skilled migration in the parents industry can do the same.
- There are but who is producing them? Adults drive consumption and production. Children just drive consumption.
From an economic perspective increased immigration is better than births. Why have non productive people around when you can just import productive people that pay the government income taxes?
<sarcasm>If there are no children around then we don't have to worry about the children anymore and can worry about important things like the economy!</sarcasm>
- Consider two scenarios:
A. You have a child.
B. You don't have a child and decide to never have a child. To make up for the decline in population that year the government issues a working visa to an immigrant. The immigrant relocates to your country and sets up their life there.
Do you think that A or B raises GDP more?
- Because children don’t contribute to GDP.
- I think it just boils down to who did you experience strong emotion with and what are/were the outcomes of that relationship.
- This isn't really targeting Linux users.
It's targeting people who want to write without distraction who might have never used Linux before.
- This is intended for people who want to use a laptop as a single use device for the purpose of writing. So basic file management and a word processor is all that is needed.
WriterdeckOS is not meant to be an OS for general computing.
Purppose built writerdecks are quite expensive. WriterdeckOS is a practical, inexpensive and resourceful alternative to a purpose build device.
For more information on writerdecks check out:
- My point was that computing in general hit the mainstream and running Linux became much more accessible and practical. So this influx of people now using computers diluted the ratio. Also non Linux based OS's became much more friendly to hackers or would be hackers.
- If anything the "highest hacker to user ratio" has diminished since then.
Hardware compatibility was a major issue. Even if hardware was compatible with Linux it often wouldn't work out of the box. Most homes had only a single internet connected device so if you borked your system you had to have friends that would know how to guide you to fix it over the phone or you had to travel to someone else house to check the internet then come back and try what you wrote down. Users who had no patience for this would get filtered out of the userbase.
- I'm getting rate limit issues on Reddit so it could be related.
- If consumer SSD's are anything to go by I could probably buy two of those and never have to think about storage for the rest of my life.
- The new drives have dual actuators to improve performance:
https://www.seagate.com/au/en/innovation/multi-actuator-hard...
- There are 36TB hard drives available.
There are 122TB SSD drives now, though.
- I had a Sony CPD-G400. I almost broke my back carrying it home from the store in the box.
That thing would do 1600x1200 at about 85Hz if I remember correctly.
A couple of years ago I got my hands on a Lacie Electron 22 Blue IV. I have to say as good as my Sony was I think the Lacie crushed it. I guess that would be expected since the Lacie was made for graphic designers.
- The problem with exercise is that we have evolved to be energy efficient and this includes being lazy when we have food/shelter so the resistance to it is high.
However once we start exercising for any period of time and observe the positive outcomes then the difficulty drops and it becomes enjoyable.
The problem is peoples expectations and approach.
> Yes, going from a modern sedentary lifestyle to running will feel rough for a few months as you acclimate
This is a terrible idea and for someone who has been sedentary they will likely just injure themselves and/or feel miserable. People don't have realistic expectations. It's better to do something like "couch to 5K" running on a grass or a dirt track. In a couple of weeks they will feel good after a run (if they are not too distracted and outward looking) then from there the runners high reinforces the behavior and they will look forward to exercising.
- - You show them your success, even share it with them if you can and thank them for their contributions towards it.
- If they ask or signal for your help you offer it and accept their decline if they don't need it.
- You pay it forward and compound the the exponential growth of their good actions.
- I'm 100% this for software.
Living off the land with minimal customization.
Thinking back I probably just put too much of it on the ice cream.
Thinking more it would be interesting to maybe add a little chili powder to the cocoa powder.