5 ms·

It is truly a marker of good vs bad people as far as it comes to participating in a high trust society. Here's an even better test, if you ask me. D

It is truly a marker of good vs bad people as far as it comes to participating in a high trust society. Here's an even better test, if you ask me. Do you ever grab one of those "stranded" shopping carts on the way in to the store? A lot of societal issues can't be cured merely by doing the right thing ourselves. Littering can't be solved merely by not littering - somebody has to pick up litter. (A lot of litter is the result of wind blowing over trashcans and such, so even in a society where nobody intentionally litters, there will be litter) Murder can't be solved merely by not murdering people - if you witness a murder, you need to do something about it, not just think "well, at least I don't murder people" and continue with your day. Shopping cart logistics are obviously many orders of magnitude less serious than murder, but I think it's a similar class of problem/solution.

bombcar 11mo ago
I try to grab an outside shopping cart to leave the world slightly less chaotic than when I entered; which is all we can do in life, perhaps. But now and then I find one of the electric ride-a-carts and that’s the reward for all my work; riding the scootypuff jr in to the glorious chords of … the Walmart theme song.
- maest 11mo ago
  > I try to grab an outside shopping cart to leave the world slightly less chaotic than when I entered; which is all we can do in life, perhaps I lived in several European countries for many years. I then moved to the US a few years ago. The US strikes me as a less civilised country, in the sense that people, on average don't return the shopping cart. In the first year after I moved, I kept returning the shopping cart, but, after seeing many others not do it, I stopped. I stopped even though I agree it is the right thing to do because I felt like a fool every time I did it. Other people decided their time is too important to return the cart, so why should I be the sucker who does it? This isn't the only example of uncivilised behaviour I've noticed in the US. Here are other examples: bypassing a long queue of cars only to merge into the lane at the last possible second, skipping red lights if no cars are around, stopping in the middle of the sidewalk and forcing other to walk around me, not saying "you're welcome", not giving up my seat on public transportation to e.g. old people, littering. Every time I see someone break these markers of civilised society, makes me less likely to abide by them next time.
  - throwaway173738 11mo ago
    > bypassing a long queue of cars only to merge into the lane at the last possible second, If everyone did this the jams would flow faster, according to WSDOT.
    - maest 11mo ago
      From what I can see, it's not about higher throughput (which stays the same) It's about reducing queue length (you use 2 lanes instead of one, so the queue length is halved) and smaller speed differences between cars on adjacent lanes. I can't find a good WSDOT source, but here's Minesotta: https://www.dot.state.mn.us/trafficeng/workzone/doc/When-latemerge-zipper.pdf https://www.dot.state.mn.us/trafficeng/workzone/doc/When-lat... Anyway, I'm not talking about cases where one lane is closed (which is what WSDOT and the Minesotta doc talk about). I'm talking about cases where there is a one lane offroad from the highway, with a queue of cars waiting to take it. Plenty of people will skip the entire queue and try to merge right at the end, blocking half of their own lane while waiting for a gap in the queue.
    - juanani 11mo ago
      [dead]
    - watwut 11mo ago
      You should not do jams with opposite direction lanes. I assume op talked about that.
    - c22 11mo ago
      This is true, but with a few caveats: * The time spent adjacent to the traffic lane should be used calibrating your speed with the speed of traffic, once you're at the front you should then be able to merge into an open spot without causing any change to the speed of the cars behind you. So many times I see people zip quickly to the front then merge in and slam on their brakes, causing an extra delay to ripple back through traffic. Some people do this at the beginning of the merge lane which is even worse. * Once you get there you should endeavor to zipper merge so multiple cars aren't trying to squeeze into one spot. As a corollary, if you're already in the lane that's being merged into you should leave an open space big enough for one vehicle to enter at this point, or better yet consider leaving the lane entirely. * And by that I mean leave the lane to move deeper into the highway, don't exit into the merging lane just to zip ahead and cut back in, this decidedly does not improve traffic flows.
slavik81 11mo ago
> Do you ever grab one of those "stranded" shopping carts on the way in to the store? Of course. They're typically more convenient than the carts that have been properly returned.
toomanyrichies 11mo ago
They taught this to us in the Scouts- "always leave your campsite cleaner than you found it".
Izkata 11mo ago
>Do you ever grab one of those "stranded" shopping carts on the way in to the store? Nope. ..but that's because I have my own cart I bring to the store.

bombcar 11mo ago

I try to grab an outside shopping cart to leave the world slightly less chaotic than when I entered; which is all we can do in life, perhaps. But now and then I find one of the electric ride-a-carts and that’s the reward for all my work; riding the scootypuff jr in to the glorious chords of … the Walmart theme song.

maest 11mo ago
> I try to grab an outside shopping cart to leave the world slightly less chaotic than when I entered; which is all we can do in life, perhaps I lived in several European countries for many years. I then moved to the US a few years ago. The US strikes me as a less civilised country, in the sense that people, on average don't return the shopping cart. In the first year after I moved, I kept returning the shopping cart, but, after seeing many others not do it, I stopped. I stopped even though I agree it is the right thing to do because I felt like a fool every time I did it. Other people decided their time is too important to return the cart, so why should I be the sucker who does it? This isn't the only example of uncivilised behaviour I've noticed in the US. Here are other examples: bypassing a long queue of cars only to merge into the lane at the last possible second, skipping red lights if no cars are around, stopping in the middle of the sidewalk and forcing other to walk around me, not saying "you're welcome", not giving up my seat on public transportation to e.g. old people, littering. Every time I see someone break these markers of civilised society, makes me less likely to abide by them next time.
- throwaway173738 11mo ago
  > bypassing a long queue of cars only to merge into the lane at the last possible second, If everyone did this the jams would flow faster, according to WSDOT.
  - maest 11mo ago
    From what I can see, it's not about higher throughput (which stays the same) It's about reducing queue length (you use 2 lanes instead of one, so the queue length is halved) and smaller speed differences between cars on adjacent lanes. I can't find a good WSDOT source, but here's Minesotta: https://www.dot.state.mn.us/trafficeng/workzone/doc/When-latemerge-zipper.pdf https://www.dot.state.mn.us/trafficeng/workzone/doc/When-lat... Anyway, I'm not talking about cases where one lane is closed (which is what WSDOT and the Minesotta doc talk about). I'm talking about cases where there is a one lane offroad from the highway, with a queue of cars waiting to take it. Plenty of people will skip the entire queue and try to merge right at the end, blocking half of their own lane while waiting for a gap in the queue.
  - juanani 11mo ago
    [dead]
  - watwut 11mo ago
    You should not do jams with opposite direction lanes. I assume op talked about that.
  - c22 11mo ago
    This is true, but with a few caveats: * The time spent adjacent to the traffic lane should be used calibrating your speed with the speed of traffic, once you're at the front you should then be able to merge into an open spot without causing any change to the speed of the cars behind you. So many times I see people zip quickly to the front then merge in and slam on their brakes, causing an extra delay to ripple back through traffic. Some people do this at the beginning of the merge lane which is even worse. * Once you get there you should endeavor to zipper merge so multiple cars aren't trying to squeeze into one spot. As a corollary, if you're already in the lane that's being merged into you should leave an open space big enough for one vehicle to enter at this point, or better yet consider leaving the lane entirely. * And by that I mean leave the lane to move deeper into the highway, don't exit into the merging lane just to zip ahead and cut back in, this decidedly does not improve traffic flows.

slavik81 11mo ago

> Do you ever grab one of those "stranded" shopping carts on the way in to the store? Of course. They're typically more convenient than the carts that have been properly returned.

toomanyrichies 11mo ago

They taught this to us in the Scouts- "always leave your campsite cleaner than you found it".

Izkata 11mo ago

>Do you ever grab one of those "stranded" shopping carts on the way in to the store? Nope. ..but that's because I have my own cart I bring to the store.