winterayars

@winterayars@sh.itjust.works

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

winterayars,

I’ve been riding an old “premium” subscription from the introduction of Google Play Music (or whatever it was called) years ago when it was introduced, for like $3/month. Seemed like a reasonable deal to me.

They did just (finally) jack the price up on me, though, so as soon as i get some free time i’m canceling.

winterayars,

But they’ll still make themselves out to be poor orphans begging for scraps on the street corner because their wealth and power pales in comparison to their greed. It could never hope to keep up.

winterayars,

Turn a bowl upside-down and slap this bad boy on top of it. Boom, proof the bowl is a plate.

winterayars,

That’s basically what Fred Phelps and crew did.

winterayars,

Yeah, i have a friend like that. Gets paid twice (maybe 3x?) what i do but has no friends and is miserable. Well, things have been getting better for him at least and i’ve been making more money lately so i guess things are looking up.

winterayars,

Fixing things is hard and getting consensus on things is hard. Easier to get people to do something when the building is already on fire. However, in the end, it’s better to not light the place on fire just do you don’t have to talk to people.

I’m fine if we eat the rich, though.

winterayars,

It’s illegal in the US.

But uh, so is catching a fish with your bare hands in Kansas.

winterayars,

Dr Stone but for computers/software dev…

Linus teaches them all best practices and then takes a 2 week hiatus from kernel dev to write a tool that defeats the demon lord.

In what world does a VPN need access to Camera and Bluetooth? (i.imgur.com)

I am fully aware of what vpn services to use and not. I am not using Express VPN, I am simply doing research for a master thesis, when I came across these results from Express VPN. If you have any ideas or corrections, please let me know why a VPN provider would need to have access to these permissions....

winterayars,

Camera could be taking pictures of QR codes to make it easier to set up a VPN.

Bluetooth could be integration with things like Yubikeys for authentication.

Dunno if that’s what they’re actually for, though.

winterayars,

Climate change. Definitely climate change as there fourth. Unless you want to count it as the fifth, i guess.

Unless it goes in its own special category.

winterayars,

Those are definitely the ones to bring to a goth event.

(Edit: The Korean ones are kf-94 fwiw.)

winterayars,

There’s a reason tech workers and college students in demanding degrees are all on Adderall (aka amphetamines).

winterayars,

They’ve got a long road ahead of them to kill that many people but i admit the thought occurred to me as well. There does seem to be a ratio being followed here.

winterayars,

That’s because you can’t beat home cooked meals.

winterayars, (edited )

This is the exact kind of fucking bullshit that i hate.

Of course it won’t fix climate change in one go

Be honest: It won’t fix it at all. It won’t significantly impact climate change. It won’t insignificantly impact climate change.

so yeah, it definetely would “move the needle”

First of all: emissions are not the target. Climate change is the target. Even if all human related greenhouse gas emissions ceased tomorrow we would still be facing catastrophic climate change and then an effectively indefinite period (on a human scale) before things settled down again. We cannot not-pollute our way out of this mess.

Let me reiterate: We can no longer change the outcome by reducing carbon dioxide emissions, and consumer car usage is a small slice of overall carbon dioxide emissions. Of course, we could make it worse. So how much do consumer cars contribute to making it worse?

I don’t know if your figure of billions of tons is worldwide or not, the worldwide number i found here is about 3 billion metric tons. (It dropped for 2020! Yay we did it!) In contrast, Wikipedia (who I believe are taking their numbers from the IPCC) lists about 35 billion tons (about 32 billion metric tons) of co2 from fossil fuel burning, with total greenhouse gas emissions of about 50 billion tons (about 45 billion metric).

Then there’s also reduction in the Earth’s ability to extract co2 due to land use (chopping down forests). This is difficult to model because it’s not a direct emission but it is undeniably a result of human activity that unbalances the Earth’s climate. That Wikipedia article earlier says that total emissions from 1870 to 2017 were about 1.5 trillion tons from fossil fuels and 660 billion tons from land use change which works out to be about 31% of the total. Note that this is total and cumulative so again: Ceasing all emissions would not change this number. No longer cutting down forests (etc) would not change this number a single gram.

Then there are other factors that are making climate change worse but they’re not that important in comparison. I’m going to ignore them because i am not a scientist and i’m not writing a scientific paper here.

I am going to be harsh, however. If you take that 3 billion number and you divide it into the 32 billion number you get about 10%, as you say.

That’s not correct if you want to make a difference for climate change.

If you take that 3 billion number and you divide it into the 1.5 trillion tons number you get about 0.2%.

So to answer the question above: how much worse do consumer cars make climate change? Well, they worsen the situation with carbon dioxide by about 0.2% per year, coming from about 10% of our overall emissions, and carbon dioxide is only one of the factors contributing to climate change. So overall? Not much.

And yeah I already know the next argument “bUt YoUr JuSt UsInG fOsSiL fUeLs To ChArGe It”…

That is not my argument.

…except you’re not necessarily, in my area (part of CA), you can choose to have 100% of your electricity provided by renewable sources for a small monthly premium ($18/month).

Oh my god, of course you couldn’t help it. The smug liberal (derogatory) virtue signalling had to come out. Jesus fucking Christ.

You understand, right, that if you pay $18 and go from a 50/50 split of fossil fuel and renewable energy (about where CA is) and your neighbor does not what ends up happening is you go 0% fossil fuel and your neighbor goes to 100% fossil fuel and nothing changes, right?

Like, you’re paying $18 not to change anything, you’re paying $18 so you can go on the internet and complain about how everyone else isn’t fixing climate change like you are.

The corporate response to climate change has been to try to convince everyone to take shorter showers, switch to an electric car, and install solar panels. That is, for individual people to do things (that don’t matter) and for corporations to continue doing things (that do matter, negatively). You unironically listed two of the three elements of a fucking climate change denial meme.

Also current renewable energy isn’t actually that great. I guess this is the right time for my pitch for nuclear power.

If you want to actually have an impact (in the “stop making things worse” direction not the “fix climate change” direction) then let me suggest nuclear power. Nuclear power is great. It’s a proven technology. Even nuclear power at its worst is still better than coal, even if you ignore the greenhouse gas emissions difference. I’d argue nuclear power is better than modern renewables too but this post is long enough so i won’t.

Right now, coal fired power plants account for 20% of fossil fuel emissions and are the single largest source of emissions. and… well… let me direct quote:

Notably, just 5% of the world’s power plants account for almost three-quarters of carbon emissions from electricity generation, based on an inventory of more than 29,000 fossil-fuel power plants across 221 countries.

Putting it a different way, almost 15% of all fossil fuel emissions come from 5% of the world’s power plants.

So it’s great that California is doing better than average, but if you want to make a difference in emissions you don’t try to change every single car on the planet over to electric, which is a tremendous task to undertake. You kill that 5% of power plants and replace them with nuclear. (Or okay if it really makes you feel better i’d be on board with renewables too but nuclear is still the better and more practical solution.)

There are a lot of steps to solving climate change beyond “buy an electric car”, and you’re right that industrial and commercial pollution accounts for the majority, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be pushing on all fronts.

If you want to make a difference right now, probably the best thing you can possibly do is advocate against coal power plants. It’s both easier to do than replacing all cars and it would have a bigger impact.

In 2035, 12 years from now, Europe plans to mandate all new cars to be electric. Europe is not responsible for the majority of passenger vehicle emissions. Most countries do not have plans that are anywhere near as ambitious. The US is only aiming at 50%, and that 50% of vehicles that get switched over won’t be the ones emitting the most greenhouse gases. (Hybrids being switched to full electrics have little impact when Ford F150s are the most popular vehicle in America.)

Meanwhile, that 5% of power plants is still out there. Industrial and agricultural emissions are still out there. Land use changes are still out there. The vast majority of everything that brought us to this point is still out there, untouched. And when will you get your 100% electric cars worldwide? In 2045? 2060? How deep underwater will Miami and New York City be by the time that happens? How many people will die in the meantime? How much further will the ecosystems of the world be destabilized?

This isn’t about “pushing on all fronts”. This is about moralizing at individual people about their personal decisions, which did not cause this problem and cannot fix it. Paying $18 to California power companies isn’t about improving the world it’s about making you, personally, feel better. Like you’ve “done your part”. Meanwhile, the planet is burning. In the coming years, it will burn more and more.

Capitalism wants to pretend that everyone acting individually can solve problems but capitalism created this problem and it cannot and will not solve it.

winterayars,

The “one state solution” is the only real way forward but it’s not surprising it’s not very popular. The Jews would be a minority in this hypothetical country and there are two problems with that:

One, the right wing types types really will only accept a Jewish-dominant theocratic state as an outcome. Everything comes second to that. Even the others feel like they “need” a safe state that’s free from generations of oppression against Jews. There are more Palestinians than Jews right now, so giving those Palestinians any kind of political representation is a non starter.

Two, how do you think the Palestinians feel about Jews right now? How do you think they would behave if given political power right now? I’m not saying they’d all turn around and look for equal but opposite revenge but I doubt they’re happy about all this. Further, do you think the Israelis are going to want to put themselves in that position?

So because of that. while i think the one state solution is the only realistic non-genocidal way forward i’m not optimistic about it coming to pass.

winterayars,

There are about 7 million Jews in Israel and about 2 million Arabs. (With like less than a million “others”? Something like that.) Palestine’s population has been declining (for some… mysterious reason…) but there are still about 5 million Palestinians.

It’s simply a question of the numbers: you can have a theocratic Jewish state of Israel or you can have a representative democracy that gives equal Rights to the Palestinians, but not both. Likud is a party of theocrats and they’ve all decided long ago which is more important to them.

winterayars,

If they’re damned if they do and damned if they don’t then why not do the right thing?

winterayars,

This is definitely not true. If you are Palestinian you don’t have freedom of movement inside Palestine let alone freedom to enter Israel. They’re not all permanently barred (gotta let them in so they can work for Israel) but they’re not free.

You’re also not able to live in peace in Palestine. Settlers regularly come in and drive people out. Food, water. medical supplies, and more are tightly controlled by Israel.

There are non Jews who are Israel citizens, including some Palestinian people, but that’s a different story and those are not the people we’re talking about.

winterayars,

Yeah you’re definitely getting pickpocketed.

given how little one vote matter, it seems to me that stripping felons of their right to vote is both petty and counterproductive if the point was to reform them into civic minded individuals ?

Also, seems kind of scary that this implies a future where so many people are in prison that their vote could actually tip the balance ?

Why is youtube recommending conservative "talking points" to me?

Hi, I am a guy in early thirties with a wife and two kids and whenever I go on youtube it always suggests conservative things like guys dunking on women, ben shapiro reacting to some bullshit, joe rogan, all the works. I almost never allow it to go to that type of video and when I do it is either by accident or by curiosity. My...

winterayars,

Let’s be honest. The companies only really care about “engagement” and the Right is more than happy to provide that.

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • localhost
  • All magazines
  • Loading…
    Loading the web debug toolbar…
    Attempt #