I would also encourage people to go to midnight showings of Tommy Wiseau’s ‘The Room’ and watch as people throw handfuls of plastic spoons at the screen. Also fun.

I miss HEB. family owned and private. Thus why they get away with treating their employees so well, paying them well, and supporting their communities all while also being the largest private employer in the state of Texas. That company is a great example of how a company can both grow to a large size and not be evil. If they ever go public you know all of its charm will instantly get cut in the name of shareholder value.

This article is written with some wild speculations by both the author of the article and the source they are quoting. When cell phones are cracked for evidence they have to use write blockers when they copy the phone. They do the analysis on the copy. The original is then re-copied in court to show what was found. This way the original is never tampered with and made inadmissible, and whatever analysis bullshit you did isn’t mixed in with your court room copy. What this also means is that your AI can hallucinate all it wants and make up any evidence you can imagine all day long, but when you get into the court room and have to then point to where the conclusions came from and you can’t-you will be standing there with a dick on your forehead and with a case being tossed out.

Think of a more direct democracy. I will oversimplify enough to annoy those from Switzerland:

Differing levels of law require differing thresholds. Country votes on a law, the majority above the required threshold vote it in. It becomes a national law. That is easy. What about when it fails? Then look to the state level. Did it pass the threshold for your state? Yes? Then it is a state law. Failed state level? Let’s look at your county/city/local level. Passed threshold? Local law.

Again, over simplified, but general idea.

While I have progressive ideas and believe the Republicans rule with malace, I also strongly believe the democrats rule with incompetence.

I would love to run for president on the party of burn down the two party system and restart from there. Make politics boring again and not some partisan winner take all spectacle. We keep pushing to out ‘wing’ the ‘wing’ and it is driving us to some bad extremes.

So yes, I will vote straight ticket Democrat for 99% of the time, but I am also disgusted by the fact anyone is even allowed to do that and people have little party letters by their name. If you didn’t research your candidate to at least know their name, then you shouldn’t be voting for them.

It is mind-blowing to me that some things are not seen as human rights and are instead seen as political posturing. In Texas we had barbed wire intentionally strung up in the Rio Grande river with the intention to drownd people and it took multiple rounds of court cases to make them take it out. Somehow killing people is acceptable rather than booking, ticketing, and sending back. Politics have now taken a place above literal lives. At the same time, when I express this I have democrats immediately agreeing and adding “just let them in!” Or “just let them stay and we will figure it out” and that is where I stop them and ask, is that what I said? No. Simply that human life is worth more than politics. Again, stringing up barbed wire in a river to intentionally drown people it true malice. But saying let them all in and figure it out later is naive at best, and incompetence at its worst.

https://youtube.com/shorts/VOys-f1HaIc

https://youtube.com/shorts/f5bftwl0h_I

Here are two quick clips. If you spend any time searching into this you will very quickly find lots more. The original comes from the making of documentary done in the 90’s

George Lucas has talked about this specific line and measurement in interviews. The idea was that if you have a better nav computer you could get places faster by planting the shortest route. One way to think of it with the hyperspace is as if all ships are held at a more-or-less constant speed in hyperspace, and thus to get there faster than someone the only real was was to find a shorter route through hyperspace. Better nav computers and sensors could plot better courses through asteroid fields and closer to sun’s without having issues, whereas poorer computers would plot really safe routes that take longer.

Looking passed the absolutely insane answer here, no one has even brought up the whole issue of AC vs DC. Batteries are DC, while your fridge that plugs into your wall running on AC. I know they make DC ones, but it isn’t like they are interchangeable.

In 2000 the Afghani was worth 75,000 to 1 USD. During ISAF occupation it was fixed at 50 to 1. It is now at 70 to 1 and dropping. Let’s stick to one argument at a time rather than playing the whataboutism game. You said the USA destroyed their economy, yet the evidence strongly says otherwise. Before 2001, Afghanistan was the second poorest country in the world. When ISAF pulled out it was ranked at about 40 (I say ‘about’ because it was still growing and changing faster and the rankings were uptated). In the short time of Taliban rule they have dropped back down to sub 33 with exact number still to be determined. (The sub 33 ranking is important because there are only 33 countries on the UN “least developed countries” list).

I would spend time debating topics like this with educated people and those that are open minded, but you do not seem like you fit either group. Do not expect a reply.

https://www.powerengineeringint.com/renewables/lcoe-for-offshore-wind-now-on-par-with-coal-bnef/amp/

https://www.powerengineeringint.com/renewables/lcoe-for-offshore-wind-now-on-par-with-coal-bnef/amp/

Covid actually had almost no impact on the prices and they continued to level off a little lower. The surprising one is the onshore wind remaining on par with solar and continues to drop (albeit slowely).

I can see that critical thinking isn’t your strong suit, but I’m willing to comment it out with you instead of just down voting.

If the price of solar is already the lowest -and still dropping- then how is the most expensive option that takes about a decade to implement a better option for right now? This apparent point of diminishing returns is only beginning to manifest in even lower prices than this 2019 chart. And this diminishing returns point is only in the cost of the panels dropping; they are still getting better in technology and improving efficiency while maintaining low prices. If your argument is “solar can’t continue on this trend forever” -no one expects anything to consistently drop almost 90% every decade. Of course it will level out. And when it does, it will STILL be the cheapest option.

Huge up front costs.

https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/economic-aspects/economics-of-nuclear-power.aspx

“On a levelized (i.e. lifetime) basis, nuclear power is an economic source of electricity generation, combining the advantages of security, reliability and very low greenhouse gas emissions. Existing plants function well with a high degree of predictability. The operating cost of these plants is lower than almost all fossil fuel competitors, with a very low risk of operating cost inflation. Plants are now expected to operate for 60 years and even longer in the future…”

“World Nuclear Association published Nuclear Power Economics and Project Structuring in early 2017. The report notes that the economics of new nuclear plants are heavily influenced by their capital cost, which accounts for at least 60% of their LCOE. Interest charges and the construction period are important variables for determining the overall cost of capital. The escalation of nuclear capital costs in some countries, more apparent than real given the paucity of new reactor construction in OECD countries and the introduction of new designs, has peaked in the opinion of the International Energy Agency (IEA). In countries where continuous development programmes have been maintained, capital costs have been contained and, in the case of South Korea, even reduced. Over the last 15 years global median construction periods have fallen. Once a nuclear plant has been constructed, the production cost of electricity is low and predictably stable.”

TLDR: If you weren’t already on the nuke train when it was going, the upfront costs are too much to make it worth it this late in the game. You are better off just getting solar/wind + battery. If you already invested in nuke, then you are good to keep updating them.

Over the course of 20 years, the US and its coalition allies in Afganistan killed approximately 50,000 civilians and there we calls for war crimes investigations. In the course of one month Israel has killed over 10,000 civilians.

I did two tours in Afghanistan and can tell you now, they are not bending over backwards to minimize it. They are using this as an excuse to indemnify themselves from war crimes prosecution.

Death toll as of yesterday was reported around 8,000. The US/coalition 20-year war in Afghanistan was (rounding UP) 50,000. That puts it at an average of 2,500 civilian deaths per year. Even THAT number was high enough for people to call for war crimes investigations. Now Israel has reached over 3x the yearly average in only 3 weeks. On track to pass 10,000 by the one month mark, too. I’m not saying that Isreal doesn’t have the right to defend its self, or even defense through offense, but there is a point that we need to agree is too far; and I think we are a bit past it.

After rereading this in the morning/afternoon and not late night I realized my mistake. BPPV is normally the posterior, more infrequently the anterior, and to be true up/down vertigo only it would have to be both canals at the same time. The vestibular organ is odd. Either way, this whole scenario doesn’t even sound like bppv (peripheral) and is most likely something up line in the brain (central).

Go see neuro. Get an mri at least.

Unlike the othe comment, this DOES sound like it could be BPPV, where something like the epley maneuver would work. Typically we would use the Semont-plus maneuver (same idea, slightly different). Or there is a fun half somersault maneuver the person could try on their own.

Bppv will be brief but intense episodes lasting seconds with lasting nausea for minutes and exasterbated by head movements. You will also see their eyes jumping or flicking (nystagmus).

The epley maneuver is to treat BPPV- where an otolith becomes dislodged and then finds its way into a semicircular canal (normally the latteral canal). If it was causing vertigo it would have to be the posterior canal. Not to say it isn’t possible, but it is the statistically least common canal to happen in. Not only that, but the epley wouldn’t treat it. Even then, this strongly doesn’t sound like BPPV, whose episodes would last seconds to minutes. If the episodes are lasting minutes to hours it is a short list of other possible things. best case this is vestibular migraine of it was vestibular related. More likely this is central involve ment and the person needs to see a neurologist. I have seen patients like this before for balance accessments. We will do the testing on them(VNG and caloric testing), but then have to tell them to go to a different department because it isn’t part of the vestibular system causing the problem. I would push to see an ENT/neuro/PCP sooner than later because worst case is it is a developing vestibular schwanoma (non cancerous tumor) and the sooner the better to take care of it or at least monitor it.