Might be some rain. Mid 70s or 60s. Yesterday we got a light mist a couple of times and even a short sprinkle once or twice, but no real rain. Today we’re supposed to be deeper in the system.
Yesterday was a big nothing for me and my list. My knee hurt, I was tired, and I basically did a Biden and just stayed in. The sunburn on my neck wasn’t helping anything either.
All of that means that today I’m playing catch up, even if my knee is bad. And if it’s bad I might have to try to see someone. My experience says there isn’t anything to be done about it, but I’d like to know what I damaged, since I must have done more damage than I initially thought. The Dr that did my knee clean up surgery 12 years ago is no longer available, and my records are probably gone by now anyway. I’ll have to find someone new. I hate breaking in new doctors. Just the history takes pages…
But we’re grid up and doctors are available. Might as well use the obammalamadingdong care I was forced to buy.
So I better get busy, lots to do.
n
(keep stacking- got a set of crutches in your preps?)
60F and 92%RH with the sound of drizzle and visible wet concrete. Probably gonna be a rainy day.
Woke up 5 minutes before my alarm, in the middle of a weird dream.
Knee still hurts. Still feel tired, but some of the fog is clearer.
Chronic pain is causing a bit of nausea but that should be something I can deal with. Lots of practice.
Time to get the breakfasts made and the people up…
n
Well, it’s looking like it might clear up outside. Sun is coming up and most of the overcast blew out. It’s a bit cooler at the moment, which happens when the clouds clear…
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/6-killed-including-1-cop-boulder-grocery-store-shooting-suspect-custody
-waiting for more info on this story.
n
On the trade magazine economy front, one of my mags seems to have gone digital only last month, Electronic Design. And I got a call to sign me up for a new one yesterday. That is typical behavior when times are tough- the mag wants to show increased circulation numbers so they start signing up people they wouldn’t normally approve for free copies. It’s like when you suddenly start getting newsletters from companies you haven’t heard from in years, or when you get cold calls where it’s clear that they are REALLY reaching back for leads.
Bad news for the economic outlook in other words.
n
Man, the people in videos coming out of Miami brawls are almost all Black. Especially vicious is watching men beating women to a pulp. Welcome to the new normal. I wonder how many of these Spring Breakers are in college. Or even have a high school diploma.
Sadly. Like some of the big grocery stores wafting artificial scents into the air. Make people subliminally hungry, and they are more likely to do impulse buys.
I’m reading an interesting book: Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. Originally, I thought the book was about primitive Sapiens species, and it is. Only, when I reached the end of that section, I saw that I was only 1/4 finished.
He continues on to a whole variety of topics, all handled very dispassionately. I don’t mean the writing is boring – it certainly is not – but he is willing to examine just about everything to do with human society. He gores many sacred oxes along the way – and he doesn’t let even a hint of his personal views show through – whatever he believes, he gores it just as thoroughly as everything else.
Which brings me to the point: He examines religions, from animism through polytheism and monotheism to…modern religions. He makes an excellent case for the idea that liberalism, socialism, communism and the like are, in fact, religions. They are large, shared belief systems. They enable large groups of people to communicate, cooperate and trust one another. People believe in them fervently, and want to convert others to their cause. Yet, none of these systems have any objective, scientific foundation.
Viewed through that lense, progressives and wokeness make a lot of sense. A shared belief system, no objective basis, but questioning the tenets is heresy. A religion.
Of course, we all have our religions. Individual rights? Individual responsibility? Piffle – arbitrary components of a belief system. It just happens to be one that I accept, and I prefer to work with people who believe similarly.
A thought provoking book. Recommended.
@brad, that’s why I rarely mention masking or vaccination anymore. It’s become a religious issue for people. No changing minds, only pissing people off.
n
Jordan B. Peterson has some great takes on “equality of opportunity” versus “equality of outcome.” The former being noble and the latter being absurd. He’s a pretty smart guy and I find his videos very engaging.
That’s called gender equality.
I’m a big believer in going grocery shopping AFTER I eat lunch or dinner and not before. It really curbs those snack food purchase impulses. I read the tip somewhere years ago and tried it and it really does shrink your grocery bill.
One note from my recent road trip to Mississippi.
Roadside advertising, IE: billboards, are still about 60% empty outside the large cities. This advertising was hit hard by the over reaction to covid and hasn’t shown much of a comeback.
@brad -re: I’m reading an interesting book: Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind.
I’m wondering if the book addresses a question that is truly unaskable in today’s climate. I’ve been wondering why the people who created technology from the Egyptians to the Renaissance all come from the Mediterranean and farther north. I haven’t seen evidence of technology in non Egyptian Africa. My brother is an African authority and he posits that several issues like extreme tribalism, easy access to food, and cheap labor (IE: slavery) kept Africans from needing or even wanting technology.
Also noted on my recent trip to Memphis …
Every article and video I’ve seen on the great ammo shortage says that all manufacturers are running “flat out” with all shifts. Yet my travel took me past the Little Rock Remington ammunition plant twice and each time the parking lots were empty. Someone is not telling the truth.
I’ve been wondering why the people who created technology from the Egyptians to the Renaissance all come from the Mediterranean and farther north
China? they created a lot more and, perhaps, before
IIRC, China was having its Golden Age (Tang Dynasty) while Europe was in the Dark Ages. The best thing a European could have done in say the 9th century was start walking east… far east…
@ ayjblog –
China created some new things historically but due to social and political structures did not capitalize on them or ‘develop’ them the way western cultures did.
This is changing in recent times but they are still better known for using, copying, and extending other people’s developments rather than creating new things themselves.
For innovation to occur there must be a desire to change the existing structure, to make a new thing to replace the old. China, islam, even India all have a distinct LACK of that desire built into their society and social structures.
The west went through the Protestant Reformation and that, I think, really opened society to change in fundamental ways.
Perhaps the chinese will have a similar thing as the communists become capitalists. Perhaps india will overcome the caste system and there will be opportunities for more of the people to change. Perhaps africa will embrace change, the scientific method, and denounce tribalism.
Perhaps the US and other western societies will stop the race toward progressivism and socialism.
Seems unlikely at this point.
n
More trade magazine data points.
Military & Aerospace Electronics magazine is pushing their digital issue, although they say “While the March print issue will still ship, we are also sending the digital edition to all subscribers”.
I’m betting the April or May issue won’t print.
n
Yes, he does talk about that, but the answer isn’t one you might expect.
His position is that – until very recently – people didn’t believe in progress. The “golden age” was in the past. Problems existed, sure, but people couldn’t solve most of them. What we see as impressive technology of the past developed slowly, over millenia. Within the lifetime of any single person, not much changed, and probably as much for the worse as for the better. For example, the Romans in 200AD fought much the same, with much the same weapons as the Romans in 200BC. The Chinese had gunpowder for hundreds of years, but still fought with swords.
In other words, there was no concept that humans even could deliberately develop new technology. Knowledge belonged to the gods. Any future golden age would be due to the coming of a messiah. The priests, given suitable offerings, could pray to cure a disease, or end a drought, or whatever – but these things were certainly beyond human ability to influence.
In his view, the turning point was the Scientific Revolution, which happened much later. And this was the result of a shift in mentality: we – piddly humans – are capable of discovering new knowledge, of developing technology to solve problems that heretofore had been only the subject of prayer and offerings. Given that mental shift, the development of science and technology was inevitable.
Why did that mental shift happen in Europe and not, say, in China? Why did lightning strike this tree and not that one? Sheer historical accident, as much as anything else. Even then, in his view, it took the advent of Capitalism to really light the fire. And that’s about where I am in the book, so I can’t say more…
Fake Fauci is claiming AstraZeneca used old data and the data is no good. I would be willing to bet that Fauci has money in Moderna and none in AstraZeneca.
Lot of problems and irregularities with AZ including wrong dosing during the test.
n
I worked in web development 20(ish) years ago for a firm whose niche was creating subscription websites for print magazines. They were all trade magazines. Mostly tech (InformationWeek, InfoWorld, etc.) but some oddballs too (Hay & Forage Grower… lol). Print advertising took a major hit in the early 2000s and some of our clients’ magazines that used to be pretty hefty started feeling more like pamphlets. Back then digital magazines weren’t much of a thing (Zinio, for example, was just getting started). I think a few downgraded from magazines to a series of email newsletters for a while and others folded entirely.
Man, the people in videos coming out of Miami brawls are almost all Black. Especially vicious is watching men beating women to a pulp. Welcome to the new normal. I wonder how many of these Spring Breakers are in college. Or even have a high school diploma.
Or how many participants were bused in from points far north to make the Governor look bad because he insists Florida remain open and has no real competition for reelection at this point.
The story about DeSantis appearing maskless at Bike Week didn’t generate the desired headlines the previous weekend.
The next big headlines could come once again from the annual underground “Orlando Invades Daytona” urban yout’ event on Memorial Day weekend, just like last year.
From what I understand, what happened this past weekend was part of a similar but less publicized urban yout’ event ending the first big week of Spring Break in Miami.
I noticed that Spring Break in most places changed some years ago from a mostly college student thing, to “urban youths” with no real college just heading out to party.
It looked really predatory and exploitative when it shifted with drunk college girls getting the brunt of it.
Now it looks like no one even pretends it’s about students taking a break.
n
Fixed it for you.
It looked really predatory and exploitative when it shifted with drunk college girls getting the brunt of it.
I believe the goal of the Dems at this point is to get a pretty, white, preferrably tattoo-free coed shot/killed at one of these events. Police pulling the trigger would be ideal, but a right wing nutter would advance the gun control agenda.
This has been a goal since the Blasey-Ford testimony at the Kavanaugh hearings when they learned that the “That could be my daughter/granddaughter” meme would make even hardcore conservatives hesitate for a moment.
God help us all the moment they accomplish the goal. The debate about gun control will be over at a minimum, but the martyr would provide plenty of cover for other issues and minimize the damage coming in the midterms.
Hi Harold. A good place to start might be with Jared Diamonds: Guns, Germs, and Steel. (It won the Pulitzer.) No explanation is complete, but it is not a bad one. To summarize: geographic luck. It is worth reading the details. Afterwards, he realized he did not deal with societal collapse (GGS is a catalog of successes). There are failures – dark ages. He wrote a follow-up. You may also want to read Jane Jacobs: Dark Age Ahead. I believe the late Dr. Pournelle mentioned this. (It’s fascinating how many times I end up referring back to something I read at Chaos Manor).
A thought: While the question of why is interesting, this is a prepping site. How it could all go wrong, or the many ways it has gone wrong in the past (medieval dark age, Easter Island, Mayan and other civilizations) may be instructive and are a fit for the common theme.
I read the Twitterati and ProgLibTurds are eating a bag of dicks now that the Boulder shooter is ID’d as a moo-slim. It wasn’t Jim Bob, but Ahmad Al-Issa. Who knows what his race and ethnicity are.
Note how the narrative is evil white guys killing Asians. Boulder was non-white, Atlanta dude killed some white people too and it doesn’t appear to have been a racist attack.
The left still uses affirmative action to discriminate against Asians though, e.g. at college admissions.
On the trade magazine economy front, one of my mags seems to have gone digital only last month, Electronic Design. And I got a call to sign me up for a new one yesterday. That is typical behavior when times are tough- the mag wants to show increased circulation numbers so they start signing up people they wouldn’t normally approve for free copies. It’s like when you suddenly start getting newsletters from companies you haven’t heard from in years, or when you get cold calls where it’s clear that they are REALLY reaching back for leads.
Bad news for the economic outlook in other words.
n
The millennials are very different from our generation (I am the tail of the baby boomers, 60 years old). They grew up with the internet and are used to googling things when they need something. Our generation tries to fix it first then googles it. And they do not study their craft as much as we do / did. We liked to read about our work and study about it. They like to network more and talk directly to others about their work. Our generations are very different.
Or, maybe it is just me.
So true. To prepare for the future we must learn from yesterday. I’ve recently been learning from a collection of YouTube videos that all major bronze age civilizations around the Mediterranean completely collapsed in a single lifetime. There’s no consensus on the cause but it seems like a confluence of events from drought in one area to political instability in another and the invasion (migration) of the “sea people” disrupted a fragile supply chain that toppled empires like dominoes. Without a reliable supply chain a technological civilization is toast. When bronze age empires couldn’t get the tin they needed to make bronze they became easy pickings and another dark age followed.
Pearls Before Swine: Putting With Anne
https://www.gocomics.com/pearlsbeforeswine/2021/03/21
Oh my goodness, that is horrible.
For reference,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3T1c7GkzRQQ
Heat pump update, it’s fixed:
Texaire returned today and finished the repair. Last Tuesday, they found a leak on the indoor coil. Warranty replacement by American Home Shield. The part came in Monday and was replaced in 30 minutes today. It’s a Lennox unit and they got a genuine Lennox coil. The company that did the original install, Metro-Tech, said Lennox was switching to aluminum cores. The tech today said Lennox was rethinking that since aluminum cores were leaking more than copper. The one Texaire received was copper core. He also said working with copper was easier for soldering. I don’t know.
AHS paid $10/# for refrigerant. Normally $60/#. Six pounds for $300 + $75 to AHS was my total cost.
I’m guessing the coil and labor ran about $1,000. The AHS warranty more than paid for itself for a year.
Getting my second jab of the Pfizer this week…from what I’ve been reading so far about AZ I would be reluctant to take it.
Also seeing several states have or are about to make jabs available to anyone 16 or older regardless of any other requirements. Some is attributed to more supply than demand. I wonder if the herd immunity projections will start to slip??
I’m guessing the coil and labor ran about $1,000. The AHS warranty more than paid for itself for a year.
A 3 ton copper a/c coil is about $3,000 by itself. And is way better than aluminium for long life. It does crud up a little more though. Should last 30+ years.
I’m guessing that vaccine uptake is much lower than projected and reported.
-out of general reluctance about vaccines
-out of concerns about these in particular (mRNA, crash development, newness, CV survival rate)
-because they had wuflu but never went to the Dr (lots of people had it and didn’t get an official diagnosis, I know of a dozen)
-because they had wuflu
-because some states have made it very difficult people are saying ‘why bother’
-because they see others getting it, and think they’ll wait for it to pass, without getting the shot
n
Guns, Germs, and Steel: I got about 3/4’s through before I couldn’t read anymore. It starts out good, real good, talking about the rise of agriculture. But he has a tendency to use the same argument for opposite results, over and over again. And his thoughts on New Guinea are… odd, at best.
Re China and technology
The Chinese not only created a number of technical innovations from earthquake detectors to odometers but used explosives in warfare from rockets to hand grenades and blasting charges to breach fortifications. They even employed semi-automatic cross bows. And in 1492 sent a exploration fleet around the pacific, likely discovering America. Yet, they never employed their technology to help the common peasant or following up on exploration with conquest. Their society wasn’t interested in change and innovation.
I’m getting the Moderna vaccine tomorrow. 1st jab. I don’t believe masks, especially the cloth masks, do much good. I also believe the danger has been greatly exaggerated.
That said, everyone needs to assess the risks and make their own decisions. EVERYTHING has risk associated with it. Seatbelts kill a certain number of accident victims that would have survived without them. Airbags even more so.
On the other hand, seatbelts save far more people that wouldn’t have survived than they kill. Vaccines truly have saved many lives.
I tolerate vaccines well, have asthma and diabetes, and more than a small spare tire. It makes sense for me to get it, in my opinion. Others have different conditions and risks and make a different decision. In a free society we can each make that choice and respect different opinions.
There’s a popular book on the subject:
1421: The Year China Discovered America
I see the MSM is all about featuring the businesses in Texas choosing to still require masks after the statewide mandate was lifted. I think they think it helps their pro-mask stance. In reality, it simply underscores what many have been saying from the beginning. Private business owners that want to require masks can do so without a government mandate. Personally, I don’t think they help much at all except create pandemic optics that certain interests like. They’re probably better than nothing when packed into a crowded room or public transportation, so I guess that’s… something. lol It seems lockdowns don’t help much either as we watch some of the most locked down parts of the world experience the same infection waves we ignorant merkins did. Just a lot of destroyed businesses and personal freedoms pissed all over and not much to show for it. The only thing we’ve demonstrated is how we’ve obviously granted government too much power. I’d love to see petition-driven legislation at the local and state levels limiting the power of mayors and governors to lock anything down in the future.
I love how CNN and MSNBC just will NOT put the shooter’s name on their front pages. Name a similar tragedy where the shooter was white and they didn’t have the name on the front page? They really do NOT want people reading the words: Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa
This might influence someone…
First Covid, Then Psychosis: ‘The Most Terrifying Thing I’ve Ever Experienced’
Like a small number of Covid survivors with no previous mental illness, Ivan Agerton developed psychotic symptoms weeks after his coronavirus infection.
If nothing else, I’m inclined to believe that all the mask wearing that’s gone on is related to the scarcity of flu cases this season. Masks vary in effectiveness not only by their content but also construction and fit/usage. When doctors and nurses start treating Covid patients without an N95 mask on I’ll think about not wearing my (N95) mask – at least until we hear more about herd immunity.
Regarding your comparison of the Covid vaccine to seat belts and airbags, there’s a difference in that we need a certain number of people to get vaccinated (or possibly to have had Covid and still have sufficient antibodies) to reach herd immunity whereas with seat belts if you choose not to wear one it doesn’t impact me.
Also won’t be surprised, once it’s available, that a children’s Covid vaccine becomes mandatory for in-person schooling.
The only thing we’ve demonstrated is how we’ve obviously granted government too much power. I’d love to see petition-driven legislation at the local and state levels limiting the power of mayors and governors to lock anything down in the future.
If you are unhappy with the way the pandemic was handled by the various elected officials, for the love of God don’t reelect these pinheads.
#1 on my list for removal from office is the hypocritical “Judge” here in our county. I don’t care about his party affiliation or his former gig as a minister.
The whole “Judge” concept should be reexamined, but I know tradition dies hard in Texas.
Might be some rain. Mid 70s or 60s. Yesterday we got a light mist a couple of times and even a short sprinkle once or twice, but no real rain. Today we’re supposed to be deeper in the system.
We got an inch or two of rain this morning. Washed everything down good and put a foot of water in the front ditch. Now there is some sort of crud in the air making it very hazy and my eyes are burning.
“Graphic details from 14th lawsuit filed against Texans’ Deshaun Watson”
https://www.chron.com/sports/texans/article/Graphic-details-14-lawsuit-Deshaun-Watson-massage-16046421.php
“Last week, Houston attorney Tony Buzbee, who represents the women, said he would file at least 12 lawsuits against Watson, but was talking to as many as 22 women with similar stories about Watson’s massage sessions.”
“Watson has denied the allegations and hired prominent attorney Rusty Hardin to defend him.”
This is becoming a case study on how you blow a $30 million/year career in the NFL. Dad thinks that the women are going to hold him up for $100 million. And yes, the women have pictures.
This is why the NBA players buy a house in each town they work in and get a girlfriend there. Looks like Watson ignored the memo and went straight to the happy ending.
“Matthew McConaughey describes why people don’t like the mask mandate”
https://www.chron.com/news/article/Matthew-McConaughey-mask-mandate-texas-abbott-16046102.php
Not Texas Governor material. Of course, he would have to move back to Texas from Hawaii.
When I went to relist an item I’ve had on EBay for several months, on and off, I was informed that my seller account is suspended unless I agree to let them manage payments instead of PayPal.
I guess that was inevitable since EBay and PayPal split up, but I gotta think about that. On several occasions as a buyer, I’ve had PayPal support me in disputes, issuing refunds where EBay’s Subcontinent-based support personnel decided in the seller’s favor, not totally understanding the context and narrowly parsing words.
What does everyone use for an Easter ham? I’ve been tasked with buying it this year (someone else just always had) and I’m sort of dumb about hams. I’ll pass on the $300 European pecan-fed hams.
This is becoming a case study on how you blow a $30 million/year career in the NFL. Dad thinks that the women are going to hold him up for $100 million. And yes, the women have pictures.
This is why the NBA players buy a house in each town they work in and get a girlfriend there. Looks like Watson ignored the memo and went straight to the happy ending.
After the Super Bowl in Tampa this year, the league insisted on enforcing the orthodoxy about social distancing, denying the Yucs the opportunity to hold an event at their training facility for the players and families after the game to celebrate regardless of outcome. Of course, nothing stopped the players who chose to do so from walking out of the team dressing room and across/down Dale Mabry Highway to the city’s infamous Mons Venus strip club.
What does everyone use for an Easter ham? I’ve been tasked with buying it this year (someone else just always had) and I’m sort of dumb about hams. I’ll pass on the $300 European pecan-fed hams.
Honey Baked or, if available, Kroger’s private label spiral sliced ham.
Kroger has a saltier taste that goes better with Cuban-style black beans we often have at holiday dinners.
“Amazon CTO Werner Vogels: AWS will erase the line ‘between physical and digital’”
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/amazon-cto-warner-vogels-aws-will-erase-line-between-physical-and-digital-144739181.html
“Amazon (AMZN) Web Services is the most popular cloud platform in the world, accounting for 31% of global market share, according to Canalys. And the platform, which turned 15 this month, isn’t finished growing, at least according to Amazon CTO Werner Vogels.”
“Vogels, who has been with Amazon since 2004, sat down with Yahoo Finance to discuss the future of the preeminent cloud platform, where he sees it expanding in the future, and how 5G and space fit into the picture, ahead of his appearance at the all-digital SXSW.”
““I think the distinction between physical and digital will disappear,” Vogels said, adding that AWS will continue to bring new intelligent capabilities to physical devices.”
A lot of buzzwords there. I wonder if he is looking for a new job ?
“How CEOs Can Effectively Bounce Their Woke Staffers: If All Else Fails, Pay Them to Leave”
https://pjmedia.com/columns/stacey-lennox/2021/03/23/how-ceos-can-effectively-bounce-their-woke-staffers-if-all-else-fails-pay-them-to-leave-n1434361
“Over the past year, CEOs and other leaders have been bowled over by a small group of loud and combative woke activists intent on bringing concepts that are corrosive to the bonds that are essential for teamwork and productivity into the workplace and our public institutions. The ideas come under the broad heading of critical race theory. This ideological push started to bubble up in 2017 when Denise Young Smith, a black female employee and 20-year veteran of Apple, was forced to resign after saying diversity was more than skin deep. At a conference, she said:”
““There can be 12 white, blue-eyed, blond men in a room and they’re going to be diverse too because they’re going to bring a different life experience and life perspective to the conversation””
““Diversity is the human experience,” she said, according to Quartz. “I get a little bit frustrated when diversity or the term diversity is tagged to the people of color, or the women, or the LGBT.””
Keep your wokeness to yourself in a business. My son got to see the roving SJW squads first hand at Google. They have been calling him to come back for another interview. He said no.
“We got an inch or two of rain this morning. ”
–and we got nothing after dawn. In fact it’s been gorgeous.
re:the sportsball player, what are the complainants complaining about? Were they massage parlor employees? Rando fans? and at the end of the day, who cares?
re: ham, you can’t go wrong with a genuine branded Honey Baked, but you need to get your order in early. here we eat just about any spiral sliced, from Costco, or HEB. It’s easy to dry out any ham, and I can’t justify the honey bakd price.
n
@greg, ebay’s new policy sux rox. I haven’t been paid since Feb, as they can’t figure out how to make a deposit to my bank. A high volume seller is going to get hammered by the bank in per transaction fees unless they change default settings.
And already they hit my backup card for fee payment, despite having a couple hundred bucks that they can’t seem to get to me.
Your buyer can still use paypal, but ebay will get in the middle and Ebay will be the one passing money to you.
Another way this sucks, I was looking to sweep the paypal money into crypto but I won’t have an increasing balance in paypal anymore. Ditto for when I am paying for stuff with paypal, eventually my balance will go to zero and they will hit my card as a backup payment option. I LIKED having a small balance ($500) on paypal for buying stuff.
n
I have considered closing my ebay seller account over this mess. And I haven’t listed anything new since the change.
re: ham, you can’t go wrong with a genuine branded Honey Baked, but you need to get your order in early. here we eat just about any spiral sliced, from Costco, or HEB. It’s easy to dry out any ham, and I can’t justify the honey bakd price.
Heating a Honey Baked is sacrilege.
My father-in-law insisted that any ham be heated until it was the consistency of shoe leather. I think it reminded him of his mother’s (lousy) cooking. It was a point of contention anytime we spent Christmas with him because I never backed down no matter how much he whined or made my wife feel bad about “ruining his dinner” with “raw” ham.
Seat belts are not a good comparison. Sewage. Try to convince someone they are infringing on personal freedoms by insisting all homes must be connected to a municipal sewage system, or have an approved septic system. Not having piles of cr@p everywhere is a public health matter as the scofflaw places not just themselves at risk, but everyone else in the neighborhood. You don’t get the benefits of clean water, no disgusting smells, etc… unless everyone complies. (If you own 1000 acres in the middle of nowhere, feel free to do what you want).
Seat belts, motorcycle & bicycle helmets, non-smoking – these are more recent public health initiatives where it is more about cajoling people to change behavior (well, yes, most places do have mandatory seat-belt legislation these days) than commanding compliance. Cajoling is the wrong approach to epidemics and vaccines. The places that are essentially COVID free: NZ, Australia, Taiwan, Korea, Vietnam, Eastern Canada all took a much harder line even before vaccines. Everyone else (including in my province) have politicians running things and they are
“negotiating” with the virus (because negotiating and finding compromises is what politicians do) and that does not work because viruses don’t care. Consider COVID a practice run for Ebola. I will be one of the people breaking down the doors to hold people down for vaccination in that situation. (Of course I won’t have to do that since with a 30-70% death rate, people will be breaking down the doors of the clinics to demand a vaccination).
I wonder if that is a generational thing. My father never ate any meat that wasn’t cooked to at least well-done, and often well past that. That may be because he came from a time and a place where you could not trust the quality of meat and so overcooked all meat just in case of parasites. As a child, I never understood why people loved steaks because after my Dad was finished on the BBQ, there was not a drop of moisture left in that piece of shoe-leather. The first time I had a juicy, medium-rare steak as a teenager (and that was NOT at home) was darn near a religious event for me. I have friends with the same experience growing up with parents from poorer parts of Europe.
My dad always over cooked beef and undercooked pork.
First time I had a rare steak and a good cut was at a friend’s house where HIS dad insisted on it. “That is too good a cut of meat to over cook it.”
Yes, it was. Beef that was sweet. Changed how I ate.
n
“Seat belts, motorcycle & bicycle helmets, non-smoking – these are more recent public health initiatives”
–those were privately funded economic initiatives. Geico was chief among the funders for the helmet laws. I’ll never have Geico for that reason (leaving off the “Government Employees” Insurance Co part.)
n
Your buyer can still use paypal, but ebay will get in the middle and Ebay will be the one passing money to you.
After they take their cut, of course. It was bad enough that I had to authorize EBay to bill PayPal without my approval, but at least there was at least one layer of control between the auction house and my bank.
At this point, I’ll probably let my current items sell out and then take whatever doesn’t move to Goodwill. I won’t close the account, however. I paid rent selling things through the site when we first moved to Vantucky and my wife effectively didn’t get paid for almost three months while I was unemployed.
Consider COVID a practice run for Ebola. I will be one of the people breaking down the doors to hold people down for vaccination in that situation.
Ebola kills too quickly and people can’t hide the symptoms, pretending to be “asymptomatic” when FOMO overwhelms their ability to think clearly.
Ebola out of control in the US is a fringe fantasy.
–those were privately funded economic initiatives. Geico was chief among the funders for the helmet laws. I’ll never have Geico for that reason (leaving off the “Government Employees” Insurance Co part.)
Warren Buffet is never shy about profiting from government mandates.
Costco pushed the masking agenda, and, IIRC, Charlie Munger holds a sizeable stake in the company.
As I’ve noted before, Costco literally wrote the laws for liquor deregulation in WA State and attempted to pull the same stunt in Oregon a couple of years later.
I noticed that Spring Break in most places changed some years ago from a mostly college student thing, to “urban youths” with no real college just heading out to party.
It looked really predatory and exploitative when it shifted with drunk college girls getting the brunt of it.
Now it looks like no one even pretends it’s about students taking a break.
n
Galveston has the same problem with the annual Kappa Beach Party with about 35,000 showing up.
Roger that, for holidays, Easter and Christmas, I get the honey baked hams.
https://www.honeybaked.com/
On some other occasions, I get one from my local Kroger store.
Actually, worked at Douglas Aircraft and socialized with Craig until he left to work full time at Honey Baked Ham Co.
https://www.corporationwiki.com/California/Irvine/craig-lee-martin/39804787.aspx
@brad -re: I’m reading an interesting book: Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind.
I’m wondering if the book addresses a question that is truly unaskable in today’s climate. I’ve been wondering why the people who created technology from the Egyptians to the Renaissance all come from the Mediterranean and farther north. I haven’t seen evidence of technology in non Egyptian Africa. My brother is an African authority and he posits that several issues like extreme tribalism, easy access to food, and cheap labor (IE: slavery) kept Africans from needing or even wanting technology.
Hi Harold. A good place to start might be with Jared Diamonds: Guns, Germs, and Steel. (It won the Pulitzer.) No explanation is complete, but it is not a bad one. To summarize: geographic luck. It is worth reading the details. Afterwards, he realized he did not deal with societal collapse (GGS is a catalog of successes). There are failures – dark ages. He wrote a follow-up. You may also want to read Jane Jacobs: Dark Age Ahead. I believe the late Dr. Pournelle mentioned this. (It’s fascinating how many times I end up referring back to something I read at Chaos Manor).
A thought: While the question of why is interesting, this is a prepping site. How it could all go wrong, or the many ways it has gone wrong in the past (medieval dark age, Easter Island, Mayan and other civilizations) may be instructive and are a fit for the common theme.
One of the things is the explosion of technology in the USA over the last 100 years. One of my observations is that the USA is the cheapest place in the world to start a business. Many of the first world countries now require a $50,000+ bond to start a company. The cost in the USA is just some common paperwork.
And also, the USA is cheapest place in the world to shutdown a business. If a business is incorporated or a limited liability company, then just file bankruptcy as there is no personal liability if there is no fraud. If the business has income, the law provides for ongoing operations while the judge decides who gets a haircut. If the business has no income then everyone gets hosed. In fact, if the business owes money to three creditors, those creditors can force a business into bankruptcy. Many new businesses have been started by picking over the dregs of an old business.
I probably have 3 or 4 hams in the freezers atm. I like ham. I will break it down into 2 pound packages and heat them for a quick meal with pasta. (mainly because Costco doesn’t sell the 3 pack of ham steaks that they used to sell.)
Ham is also a great way to feed a bunch of people if needed.
n
Once you have people buying casualty insurance, it is certainly in the interests of the insurer to reduce the number of claims, if for no other reason than to gain from higher premiums and fewer claims paid before the claims experience goes down. It is also in the interests of the insured if there are less injuries and if their premiums go down. That doesn’t mean you will like wearing a helmet / seat-belt. I don’t agree that it is all “privately funded economic initiatives”. I’m up in Canada with a public health care system. It is certainly in the government’s interests to reduce occurrences of avoidable severe injuries or chronic disease (lung cancer) to reduce the costs of operating the health care system. I might even see a reduction in taxes (more like they won’t increase at the same rate).
Yep, looks like Sudden Jihadi Syndrome
“Boulder Shooter Identified As 21-Year-Old Ahmad Al-Issa, Charged With 10 Counts Of Murder”
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/6-killed-including-1-cop-boulder-grocery-store-shooting-suspect-custody
n
My only beef (or pork?) with Honeybaked Hams is you have no choice but to get them spiral sliced, right? That can make serving easier, but I like to cut off a thick slab of ham sometimes and not have the thickness dictated by the spiral slicing.
First time I had a rare steak and a good cut was at a friend’s house where HIS dad insisted on it. “That is too good a cut of meat to over cook it.”
Bern’s Steakhouse in Tampa used to have a lengthy caution in the menu against ordering a steak “Well Done”. I think it disappeared since we left Florida, with the owner family and their last chef parting ways.
My father-in-law disliked Bern’s of course, claiming it was overrated.
re:the sportsball player, what are the complainants complaining about? Were they massage parlor employees? Rando fans? and at the end of the day, who cares?
Apparently they advertised on social media and came to his house to give him a massage. I know a lady at my church who does this, have massage table will travel. They just give massages, no happy ending. He forced them to give the happy ending. Not good, they are not sex workers.
Plus, he has money. Lots of money attracts lawyers like ants at a picnic.
That used to be quite common. Something to the effect of, “We cannot guarantee the quality of any steak if it is cooked past medium.” (i.e. Don’t demand your meal be comp’d because you ordered your sirloin well-done and now it’s dry and tough.) If it’s a naturally tender cut like a Filet Mignon or Top Sirloin or the like then I’ll order it rare. If it’s a tougher cut I’ll go with medium rare as I think the extra cooking time helps breakdown some of that connective tissue. The only exception is ground beef (e.g. hamburgers) which I’ll get medium, but I have horrible luck with that. 75% of every damn hamburger I order medium is served to me well-done.
Seat belts are not a good comparison. Sewage. Try to convince someone they are infringing on personal freedoms by insisting all homes must be connected to a municipal sewage system, or have an approved septic system. Not having piles of cr@p everywhere is a public health matter as the scofflaw places not just themselves at risk, but everyone else in the neighborhood. You don’t get the benefits of clean water, no disgusting smells, etc… unless everyone complies. (If you own 1000 acres in the middle of nowhere, feel free to do what you want).
Fort Bend County just threatened to throw me in jail for my commercial sewage tank since my septic tank contractor had not gotten the annual sample and had it tested. Class A misdemeanor. He got a text from me saying “get this done now !”. He got it done.
We play this game every year. He takes care of several hundred septic tanks and just runs from tank to tank. But the commercial tanks have extra rules.
I am scared that one day that Fort Bend County will come out here and count heads. If you have tenants and with 25 people using your well water, they can force you to register with the state as a potable water producer. That means monthly water sample grabs by a third party and several licenses along with jump through this hoop today because we are inspecting you.
they are not sex workers.
–depends where they were advertising whether he would have thought they were or not. It’s a common dodge.
n
they are not sex workers.
–depends where they were advertising whether he would have thought they were or not. It’s a common dodge.
n
Doesn’t matter. No means no.
A couple of years ago someone made a joke about happy endings at massage parlors, so I did some checking (on my employer’s time – I wouldn’t never waste my personal time on such things) and looked up some of the obviously Asian massage parlors in town. Unlike other massage parlors that list their services and perhaps which masseuses are on staff and their various certifications they instead just had a bunch of profile photos of Asian women working there quite obviously set up to pick by looks rather than skillset, experience, or qualification. I thought to myself, “this is a little shady.” Then I saw a Google reviews for several that were crazy heavy on the innuendo. Stuff like, “Great massage! Got the release I needed. I’ll be back.” Other mentions from the naive with stuff like, “…they wanted a tip upfront which seemed weird.”
I mentioned it to a coworker of mine that told me he went to one once expecting an actual massage (or so he says) and the lady reach under his towel and touched him. Apparently, that’s how that particular place operated. They would touch you like that before any money changed hands and if you were an undercover cop you’d have to stop them but you couldn’t prosecute them because no money had been handed over. After the massage he was billed $150 and that was in the early 1980s.
I have to put the obvious but still must be explicitly stated for some fucking reason disclaimer here: I’m not saying all Asian run or Asian staffed massages secretly specialize in sexual services.
…but a LOT of them do and everybody seems to know it. It’s like law enforcement has just collectively turned a blind eye toward it.
My grandfather had his meat cooked to the charcoal stage. The meat could not be cut, it had to be chiseled. In my opinion, meat should not crunch when a person chews. My grandfather’s did. Or maybe it was his false teeth.
@Lynn
“So many books, so few decades of life left. “
Yup, gotta make ’em count.
I tried the main sequence of the Stirling, didn’t get interested. Premise of the prequel didn’t grab me, either.
“The millennials are very different from our generation (I am the tail of the baby boomers, 60 years old). They grew up with the internet and are used to googling things when they need something. Our generation tries to fix it first then googles it. And they do not study their craft as much as we do / did. We liked to read about our work and study about it. They like to network more and talk directly to others about their work. Our generations are very different. “
Yup. Nailed it.
@Brad
from the Amazon listing for the ebook bundle:
“Discover humanity’s past and its future in this in this special e-book collection featuring Sapiens—a reading pick of President Barack Obama, Bill Gates, and Mark Zuckerberg—and its acclaimed companion Homo Deus.”
That’s okay. Obama hasn’t read it and it’s even money that neither have the two pasty face sweaty liars.
@Chad
“What does everyone use for an Easter ham? “
Hormel Cure 81. Straight high-quality ham. Enhance as you see fit.
I like my bacon crazy crispy. Almost to the point that when you tap it with your fork it shatters. Crunchy, crunchy, crunchy! That’s also how I like the pepperoni on my pizza. When we order pizza in I’ll throw my slices of pepperoni under the broiler for a few minutes to crisp up the edges of the pepperoni.
There was a series in the late 1970’s called “Connections”, by James Burke, first aired on PBS. They’re available now on YouTube. The series discusses the “triggers of change” from the old world into the new. In the first episode, Burke talks about some of the reasons why change didn’t happen in China; there was no way to get ahead. Chinese society was static, and inventing something COULD NOT “change the world”. Medieval Europe was much the same; you did what your father did, and your son will do what you do. But after the plagues, there were chances to step out of the past and forge something new.
My grandfather had his meat cooked to the charcoal stage. The meat could not be cut, it had to be chiseled. In my opinion, meat should not crunch when a person chews. My grandfather’s did. Or maybe it was his false teeth.
I like my bacon crazy crispy. Almost to the point that when you tap it with your fork it shatters. Crunchy, crunchy, crunchy! That’s also how I like the pepperoni on my pizza. When we order pizza in I’ll throw my slices of pepperoni under the broiler for a few minutes to crisp up the edges of the pepperoni.
I now buy the microwave bacon at HEB and set it for 3.5 minutes on our 1,000 watt microwave. Instructions say 2 to 2.5 minutes. Comes out right before the charcoal stage, me and my dog love it. The wife says it is ok. Yes, it will shatter if you tap it with a fork.
https://www.heb.com/product-detail/hormel-black-label-microwave-ready-bacon/118042
“”Going To Get Ugly” – Global Plastic Shortage Triggered By Texas Deep Freeze”
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/global-plastic-shortage-triggered-texas-deep-freeze
“The cold snap that shut down oil fields and refineries across Texas last month has severely impacted several petrochemical plants caused a global shortage of plastics, according to WSJ. Plastics produced on the Gulf Coast are essential for carmaking, medical devices, homebuilding, and consumables.”
“Prices for polyethylene, polypropylene, and other plastics used to make automobiles, computers, and pipes have reached their highest prices in years due to the shortages produced by the shuttering of petrochemical plants across Texas and other Gulf Coast states due to cold weather in February.”
Ah, the Feb 14 – 19 Texas deep freeze gift that keeps on giving.
The Formosa Plastics plant across Lavaca Bay from my parents house shut down all of the plastics making equipment for at least a week. They have a large pipeline to a film plant about ten miles north, I think that closed down also. Each plastics train makes 1.5 ??? million lbs/day of plastic pellets. They have two trains running now and they are trying to get the third train online.
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/03/just-syrian-born-boulder-shooter-ahmad-al-issas-identity-previously-known-fbi/
I guess they were too busy looking for 3%rs and Oath keepers to look twice at hot headed foreign born islamists.
n
n
Preaching to the choir here…now how do you get this message into the other 99% of the voters? The ones that always vote the party line,those that vote for the incumbent based solely on name recognition, etc. And lost count of how many times I’ve said it but “easily” solved with term limits.
This is what we get when the competition hasn’t yet figured out how to dethrone the ‘King of the Mountain.’
Or adjust the system – if you’re anti-helmet but choose to ride in a helmet required state then that state can set health policy such that if you’re in an accident and obviously riding without a helmet then sorry, no help for you. Hypothetical of course, would never come to be.
Nick – Love your turn of phrase in today’s post
I will adopt that to indicate lazing around and doing nothing = pulling a Biden.
So today I pulled a Biden, did nothing, called a lid at 9am and just recuperated from the sinus attack.
Never got the chance to go to Bern’s. My preference is porterhouse and to me, for that cut the best is found at Peter Lugers in Brooklyn, NY.
[added]
And if you go for lunch and get the burger it will come medium if that’s what you ordered.
RE: Technology innovation
I completely forgot to include the Americas in the list of non-technology peoples. Pre-Columbus, I don’t think they even had any metal working other than soft gold & silver. Not even a bronze age. The entire north and south continent was essentially in a stone age technology. Given that we know the Vikings sent expeditions and suspect that other bronze and copper age civilizations had some interaction, including Egyptians, I am astounded that no enterprising Indian began to look into the source of the metals from these incursions.
And yes, I fondly remember CONNECTIONS by James Burke. Especially the episode where he described how the black death in Europe led to the use of underwear.
Legalize it, tax it, and move on to more pressing issues (women doing it under duress or underage of course excluded).
I’ve had this a few times: https://www.firstwatch.com/menu/seasonal/million-dollar-bacon
Indigenous Americans did a bit of copper working up by the Great Lakes starting from 8000 years ago or thereabouts. The knowledge of how to do it died out. SFAIK the reason isn’t fully known but there was speculation about climate change (of course) and that the copper tools weren’t as good as the stone or wood tools otherwise in use, or at best not enough better to be worth the extra effort and skill needed.
There’s also some apologia about tin not being readily available, which prevented bronze from being made. That sounds reasonable but I know that other metals can be used in making useful copper alloys so I don’t know as I totally buy it.
My suspicion: Only the one tribe or group of tribes knew the secret of extracting metallic copper and they were killed off or subsumed or at least beaten badly enough by invaders that the craftsmen were killed. I base this theory on nothing but my all-pervading cynicism concerning the theories set forth in popular-audience science pieces. Note, though, that my theory does mesh with inability to set up a trade route for tin or other alloying metal and even with climate change changing herd migration patterns.
re Guns, Germs, and Steel, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I suspect that Diamond wrote GGS in response to The Bell Curve. Through page after page, GGS explains that it’s not intelligence which explains differences in inventiveness and martial success and other success but rather happenstance of geography and lucky presence of natural resources.
Although fairly rare, seat belts can also protect surrounding vehicles and pedestrians in the case of minor collisions. Being kept in position to control the car is part of the job of a driver’s seat belt, and why at least the driver should be required to wear one. I was in a parked car when an elderly gent turned a corner and his car slipped on some ice for a few feet, then grabbed dry pavement. The shock threw him into the passenger footwell, and his car continued on to hit the parked one I was sitting in. He could have easily avoided the collision if he had been in a position to do so. I was fine, but he could have killed a pedestrian.
Motorcycle helmets only protect the rider, but like seat belts, eye protection can prevent the rider from being distracted by a foreign object and endangering surrounding vehicles and pedestrians. I once lived in a jurisdiction that required eye protection but not helmets. Approved eye protection was either glasses, goggles, or a windshield meeting certain dimensions.
It can be argued that a helmet protects society from the burden of treating more severe injuries. If that is really true, then all auto passengers should be required to wear helmets. There are far more head injuries to auto occupants than motorcycle riders. Duh, that’s because there are way more auto passengers!
Finally, maybe one of our neighbors to the North can verify this. I think I read that at least one Canadian province, or maybe all of Canada, once considered restricting medical payments to people in cars who were injured while not wearing a seat belt. I think this was rejected because it would be very hard to verify. Or something like that.
All these societal arguments bother me. I live in a nation that once treasured individual freedoms. Not as much recently.
And, BTW, one Eastern European nation rejected antismoking campaigns on the basis that smokers cost the government run healthcare system less because they died younger. At least that was one claim.
Now, I will do a Biden and snooze. Or is that doing Biden’s bidding?
Am wondering if the evidence that the vast majority of the worlds population was technology agnostic could be one answer to the Fermi question? Perhaps we have not seen evidence of space faring civilizations because intelligent life on a whole avoids technology?
Leaving out the evidence of off-world vehicles being leaked by the pentagon.
RE: Motorcycle helmet laws, seatbelt laws, drug laws on the whole
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be “cured” against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals.”
C.S. Lewis
I suspect that there are few spacefaring civilizations because you have a narrow window for your civilization to become big enough to make the leap into space, and when your easily accessible metals run out and your civilization crashes. Next time around all the easy to get to metals are gone. So if you hold it together long enough to get access to space based materials, and you don’t dawdle until it’s too late, you make the leap.
I suspect there are few contemporaneous space faring civilizations because space is really really big and has been expanding outward for a long time, and they would be widely spread in distance and time (and would NEED FTL travel to do it at all.)
I’m not ready to rule out FTL travel; if aliens showed up tomorrow with working drives, we’d figure out where we went wrong, and make it work. It would likely be something we had already looked at but that was thrown away as a fringe idea, too far off the beaten path, because that’s how our science seems to work.
BTW, the existence of aliens and contact with them has been working it’s way up my list. I said some time ago that I thought someone was doing battlespace prep with the idea of real live aliens, and they’ve picked up the pace in the last year.
n
“I fondly remember CONNECTIONS by James Burke.”
–I just ripped the DVD collection yesterday, and I have the companion book too. I want to watch it with the kids, soon.
n
Connections was the thing that led me to decide that simply falling back 100 years in tech wasn’t possible. The problem is infrastructure. The infrastructure to support that tech won’t be in place. No rail system. No coal for your farm forge. No horse collars in the catalog, nor all the other stuff that let someone survive at Little House on the Prairie levels. No stoves, plows, rakes, harrows, wagons.
You can build some of that up, but where is the seasoned wood for the wagon wheels? Where are the draft animals?
That infrastructure is gone, and falling back won’t put it back in place.
n
So much about “restraints”. (and no this is not about massage parlors). I can say we don’t make medical care conditional here. (Well, if it’s covered, it’s covered. Counter example: cosmetic surgery for vanity is NOT covered.) You can have a “hold my beer” moment and whatever happens, you will still get care. You really don’t want to ever go down that policy path (it is a slippery slope) of who is morally entitled to health care. Doctors and nurses are completely uninterested in why you got hurt at the time of presentation, they just want to get on with fixing you.
I can imagine someone saying, “hey you don’t wear a seatbelt, that’s your fault” in a moment of madness. It is of course, beyond completely impractical. Imagine someone dying of their injuries because the emergency room staff were told or incorrectly thought the patient was not wearing a seatbelt. Lawsuits, careers ruined, political heads rolling – this will not happen.
It’s a great quote, full of vim and vigor – always loved it, but NO. No “omnipotent moral busybody” exists and those laws are not just for your own good though if you are in a serious accident, you might be thankful. Insurance companies benefit, the insured benefit from lower premiums, as noted above, other individuals present may benefit. Families benefit if they don’t have to grieve over loved ones who died in accidents. Finally, first responders (and their families) benefit from not having to deal with the PTSD that comes from collecting body parts when someone is violently thrown from a car.
Space is large, but time is long. I think you could do it sublight with generation ships if you were determined to do so. It may be that once you get to the point you can, you also have the technology to make your local solar system more spacious (terraforming, etc…) and so comfortable that you don’t need or want to move on. It may also be that no advanced civilization can keep it together for long enough to get to the point of moving beyond the local system too. It is that old question – if the universe is 15 billion years old and can support intelligent life then where are all the aliens? (The Fermi question, with credit to hcombs for mentioning it first.) Most of the answers are sobering.
Fondly remember Connections, also.
@Nick
Eric Flint’s 1632 series provided some interesting discussion related to how long they could sustain their technology before “falling back”.
But I don’t expect that any rational plan would have a chance to develop. The immediate problem for the human population, as @Lynn pointed out some time ago, is that 90% of the world population will starve, and quickly. No fuels, no transportation, no fertilizer, no seeds, no pesticides, not one working tractor out of 100 even if you did have fuel. Really no outcome except dying in the cold and dark.
Now I’m being depressing.
“I suspect there are few contemporaneous space faring civilizations because space is really really big and has been expanding outward for a long time, and they would be widely spread in distance and time (and would NEED FTL travel to do it at all.)”
I believe the biggest factor is simply lack of overlap in time . Take a relatively large volume of local space 1000 ly in radius with stars of nominally the same approximate age. Relatively few have planets in the liquid water range. The evolutionary window for developing intelligence is millions of years, and it’s unlikely that there will be more than one at a time in the local group that is broadcasting radio and detectable over long distances. Technology develops and radio diminishes. How much radio broadcast energy is going out now compared to 20 or 50 years ago and what does that do to detection distance?
If other civilizations are out there they may not be listening at all because they know that FTL is not possible and two-way communication is nearly impossible with centuries of time lag. Or perhaps Vinge was right about singularities. Or perhaps Taylor was right that it’s better they not find you.
sheesh
More depressing. Time to turn in.
Someone might be able to do generation ships, but not humans. You can’t even get projects that last a single lifetime, let alone generations. And there is no ‘wishful thinking’ when it comes to maintaining something that big for that long, you must have actual competence, and that is both rare and hard to keep a hold of, and scoffed at by the wishful thinker types.
n
Connections was the thing that led me to decide that simply falling back 100 years in tech wasn’t possible. The problem is infrastructure. The infrastructure to support that tech won’t be in place. No rail system. No coal for your farm forge. No horse collars in the catalog, nor all the other stuff that let someone survive at Little House on the Prairie levels. No stoves, plows, rakes, harrows, wagons.
You can build some of that up, but where is the seasoned wood for the wagon wheels? Where are the draft animals?
That infrastructure is gone, and falling back won’t put it back in place.
n
Have you noticed that all of the new infrastructure supports are either concrete or steel ? Wooden poles are too expensive now. The wooden framing for homes has doubled in price since January. Wood is on its way out as a building material.
I’m another chapter or two farther in the book. Why Europe? He ascribes this to cultural factors that made Europeans more willing to say “we don’t know”. Through the 15th or 16th century, technology was more-or-less equal across Europe, the Middle East and Asia. In fact, economically, Europe was the dwarf.
But Europeans were the ones willing to erase imaginary dragons from the world maps and leave blanks. Blanks begging to be filled in. This applied not only to geography, but to science and knowledge in general. Cultural factors: “religion” in the larger sense. Systems of shared beliefs, where most systems in the world said “we already have all the answers, stop asking questions”. Why Europe? He doesn’t answer that question; perhaps there is no answer.
Glad I didn’t know that – that’s hardly a good recommendation. OTOH, as you say, most likely they haven’t actually read it…