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wqaatwt
searching PlanetScale…
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631.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
US has a higher proportion of university graduates than almost every European country. Especially e.g. Germany is almost 2x lower. It’s not strictly true in all cases but generally it seems that free or subsidized higher education results i
632.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
> and still do), but usually not to the death It usually wasn’t to the death in ancient Rome either. Unless your were being executed. I don’t think that the violence part was unique in any way, Romans were the first commercialize it and
633.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
What perfect market? What is that even supposed to mean..
634.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
Sealing liquids user pressure on a large scale wasn’t really feasible back in those days though. They were just generally kept in wooden barrels.
635.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
Hops weren’t that popular until the 1400-1500s (or not used at all in some places like England) though
636.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
Yes and ancient Greeks and Romans already knew that boiling water somehow makes it safer to drink. Yet people continued wasting resources on time on making beer and similar drinks due to whatever reasons..
637.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
Right.. yet most beer in the middle ages was not hopped. In some areas like Britain it was virtually unknown and throughout most of Europe it didn’t become popular until the 1500s or so. Sure, IPA can last for a very long time (that was kin
638.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
You’d have to go quite far upriver to avoid drinking seawater (since Thames is tidal) even before all the pollution.
639.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
Yet same wouldn’t apply to stale beer that went bad after a few days or weeks?
640.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
True, yet those major tech companies are still incentivized to make good products to some extent if they want to remain monopolies longterm. Just look at Intel.. If you have the government forcing everyone to buy your products regardless of
641.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
> Internet came from the military originally, the Web came from CERN, That’s certainly true, yet 90-99% (exact percentage is debatable) of progress came from non government funded organizations. > extent is that just structural Genera
642.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
Companies that don’t have to compete have no incentives to make good products. Especially when high level government officials (i.e. people controlling their funding) are their clients and jot end consumers. Wasting time/resources to m
643.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
I don’t know if that many Nobel prizes were rewarded to any anyone working on software or even computing in general.
644.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
Or the majority of human history.. But of course it depends on how you define “free market competition” (markets are very rarely even close to being free without significant regulation). Entities which end up “winning” almost inevitably do
645.
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wqaatwt
2y ago
> most progress Well most progress in computing, software and related areas did come from private companies. > True free market competition creates monopolies and That’s where regulation must come in. To stop monopolies from forming o
646.
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wqaatwt
2y ago
If it’s government owned/controlled it will be much, much worse than Microsoft (purely from the product quality perspective)
647.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
> A new system vendor needs to be created If it’s not created and grown organically (with some extra funding and indirect support) it will certainly and inevitably suck. Government bureaucracies can’t directly establish and build a tech
648.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
There is a difference between having 20 and 40 vendors, though?
649.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
According to data that we have from Western sources (of course still take with a grain of salt since getting accurate statistics from the USSR on any topic was near impossible) average Soviet citizen consumed only slightly less calories tha
650.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
Did they literally starve in the 80s? I mean I’m not rejecting you experience it would just be interesting to hear more.. > that life was good? Never made such claims or that there were no shortages. Famine is something else though..
651.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
> is arguing about the budget over a whole year How and why does that change anything in any way?
652.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
> So you don't have to go beyond 75% renewables to start with. I think the 75% aggregate over some period. If 25% of your total capacity is nuclear/hydro you will still have extreme shortages during peak times if there is no su
653.
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wqaatwt
2y ago
> I can say the opposite You mean your are aware of an actual famine in the UUSR in the late 80s? > Not all ex-USSR ended up like belarus or russia None besides the Baltic states did well though (and they are somewhat special due to h
654.
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wqaatwt
2y ago
> world, but a cursory google shows that the situation is quite simila IIRC US is quite permissive in that regard? 12-14 is generally standard across much of Europe while in US that’s generally viewed as quite restrictive?
655.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
Well if we go to an even more extreme degree with the devil’s advocate thing: what is the difference between an ~4 month embryo (or any cutoff after which miscarriage becomes very unlikely) and a newborn? Either of them isn’t a real person,
656.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
> embolden opposition If there even is one. In the USSR most reformists or people who achieved real power after the collapse were opportunistic party insiders who were at the right place at the right time. There were some exceptions of c
657.
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wqaatwt
2y ago
> can't physically Why? There is no need to increase their number. > overshadowed by the hidden assertion Even then it’s still superior. Even if everyone ignores the individual candidates and votes for a party in e.g. a 5 member
658.
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wqaatwt
2y ago
Not that it justifies burning random cars but it’s not entirely irrational. If some people stop buying Tesla just because they are afraid that someone would vandalize it etc. that does achieve something..
659.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
They are not the same though. Equating both acts is disingenuous and at the very least distasteful. One is destruction of private property other is an attempt to overthrow the government and possibly murder politicians the mob does not agre
660.
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by
wqaatwt
2y ago
Just replacing FPTP or any other proportional non-party list system would accomplish that.
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