NickM

23 ms·

271.
by NickM 6y ago
It's a tricky example because the Republican was effectively the third party candidate in that election. But once you realize that, the spoiler effect is very easy to see; the Republicans would have mostly preferred the more centrist D
272.
by NickM 6y ago
I came here to post that link. This is by far the best introduction to the topic that I've ever seen, and makes a complex issue with plenty of subtle, non-obvious consequences very accessible.
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by NickM 6y ago
Ranked choice has the benefit that the there is no point in "gaming" your vote, so your optimal strategy and nash-equilibrium is to provide your real candidate preference order. This is very demonstrably false, both theoreticall
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by NickM 6y ago
I do sometimes wonder if the lack of preemptive multitasking and memory protection in classic Mac OS may have ironically led to better quality software. Users are forced to be less tolerant of bugs if a piece of buggy software can lock up y
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by NickM 6y ago
I mean, that's a cool idea, but if the goal is to reach long-term sustainability then that still kinda seems like a dead end, no? Even in the best case scenario where nothing goes wrong and we're not emitting CO2, eventually we&#x
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by NickM 6y ago
Even if creating methane is less efficient, replacing natural gas with synthetic methane still seems much more practical than trying to replace every single natural gas powered furnace, boiler, hot water heater, dryer, stove, oven, etc. etc
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by NickM 6y ago
I mean, I agree with the sentiment, but also you're assuming you'd similarly waste half a day for a Tesla repair, and that's usually not the way things work. Tesla will frequently send a technician to a customer's home o
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by NickM 6y ago
In general, anything Tesla related gets more coverage than an equivalent issue for any other car maker. I remember a few years back when Autopilot accidents would make national news while any other generic car wreck doesn't cause anyo
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by NickM 6y ago
Just my own personal experience, I've owned two Teslas (a 2014 Model S and a 2018 Model 3) and they both had a pretty good number of problems here and there. The S was particularly bad, though that is maybe not surprising since it was
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by NickM 6y ago
>It would be best if nobody went That seems like a pretty radical thing to say. Sure, some people go into debt for degrees with questionable job prospects, but you really believe that the world would be better off if nobody went to col
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by NickM 6y ago
I don't buy that excuse at all. Sure, perfection is impossible, but there's a very, very broad spectrum of quality that spans between "perfect" and "completely unusable". To say "well, we can't be per
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by NickM 6y ago
We're talking about people thinking "this company has done a lot of underhanded stuff in the past, maybe they're doing another underhanded thing that they clearly have the ability and motivation to do." I fail to see how
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by NickM 6y ago
I really loved Permutation City, and loved the beginning of Fall, but man it felt like Fall just turned into a really hard slog after a certain point. I have definitely enjoyed some of Neal Stephenson's other novels too, even slower-pa
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by NickM 6y ago
If you are looking for directions in a city, what matters most to you is that the roads look correct. This is why the Mercator map is used. Whoa, wait a second...is this saying that roads which look straight on a map are actually not stra
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by NickM 6y ago
What's wrong with potassium chloride? I've been using lite salt (50/50 sodium chloride and potassium chloride) in my diet to help make sure I get enough potassium, and your comment has me a little concerned.
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by NickM 6y ago
But if someone "works out heavily and supplements," that should show up in self reported physical activity, and indirectly in BMI. Well, not to nitpick, but people with high muscle mass can easily end up with an "obese&quot
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by NickM 6y ago
Maybe because the internet actually provides tremendous value to society in exchange for that energy, unlike Bitcoin. Or maybe because there's no inherent reason why the internet couldn't be made more energy efficient, also unlike
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by NickM 6y ago
Yes, 100% agree. Unless we change the system to stop these abuses, then the good people who "do the right thing" and quit will simply be replaced by other new employees who don't give a shit. The end result is that bad people
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by NickM 6y ago
Well, I'm not familiar with many examples relating to corporations either way, but I think legislation is a great example. There have been countless instances of citizens starting successful political movements within their own countri
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by NickM 6y ago
Yes, I was going to comment something similar. "The majority of women" is clearly not the same as "the women you've personally witnessed hooking up with your friends at bars in NYC".
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by NickM 6y ago
The single argument I made was quite clear and unambiguous. Everything composed of matter is finite in nature, and that fact contradicts your previous suggestion that land is somehow special in this regard. I want to give you the benefit
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by NickM 6y ago
Recycling and wearing a mask at least have a direct impact on the physical world, and voting has a very small chance of having a very high impact which makes it rationally worthwhile. I’m not sure I agree that those examples are the same. I
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by NickM 6y ago
Where did he answer that? I re-read the post but I don't see anything like what you're referencing. Voting with your wallet is another possible approach, but that only works if the lost revenue from all the people who care enough
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by NickM 6y ago
I'm always conflicted when I read about this kind of thing. I do think Facebook is actively making the world worse in many ways, but is it better for the people who care about this to quit in protest, or is it better if they stay and t
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by NickM 6y ago
Getting too much of many vitamins can harm your health though.
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by NickM 6y ago
The Hyundai Ioniq is a similarly shaped EV as the Model 3, and it gets very similar numbers - 133 MPGe (Ioniq) versus 141 MPGe for the best version of the Model 3 Standard Range The Ioniq has substantially less range than the Model 3, and
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by NickM 6y ago
Yeah all good points, and just to add, there's also the challenge of maintaining perfectly reliable and low-latency communications over any sort of wireless medium in a variety of unpredictable outdoor conditions.
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by NickM 6y ago
It was abandoned because fast charging stations keep improving, and are much simpler and cheaper to operate than battery swap stations. It's already at the point where you can take a 400-500 mile road trip in a Model 3 with maybe a sin
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by NickM 6y ago
Even typical Americans struggle with this sometimes if they have, say, hyphenated last names. I've encountered plenty of software out there that will reject or fail on even such a common case as this.
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by NickM 7y ago
If you live in the US you could buy Series I Savings Bonds from the government. They have a fixed rate which is set when you buy them (currently very low) but they also return an additional rate that varies over time based on inflation. (Th

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