Randomness thread, part two.

[rong]

Poor people would. Ongbonga definitely would.

[rong]

Private roads would pretty much revolutionize the economy IMO. Peak load pricing = no more rush hour. People actually would carpool. Mass transit would actually get invested in. Probably would make a huge dent in climate change as well.

No more rush hour for those that can afford the Pay. A longer time between leaving home for work and arriving home for those that can't.

[rong]

Agree with the car pooling and climate change points which would possibly make it a good idea anyway.

But u don't accept that it would be universally better for everyone.

[rong]

Ate there any examples of large scale private roads? Not the odd one that you pay to use, but an entire network with no free option?

[OngBonga]

Today I have been sunbathing in my underwear.

I'm wealthy, I just don't have any money.

[OngBonga]

There is another way to revolutionise the economy, without filling the pockets of shareholders.

Free public transport.

Of course, it's not free, it's paid for out of tax. But people will save money because the extra tax will be more than offset by lower commuting costs, unless of course you choose to drive anyway.

Make people pay for public transport whether they want to use it or not, and more people will use it.

Fuck privatisation. Yes it encourages competition where cometition can exist, but it's not like rival companies can build new roads to compete with the current infrastructure. Whichever company gets in first will quickly have a monopoly, and the benefits of competition are negated. This will mean higher costs for road users, because not only has maintenence got to be paid for, but dividends too.

When something moves from public to private hands, costs are naturally incurred because profit becomes the primary motivation, rather than things like strengthening the wider economy and the relentless other benefits that free public transport would provide.

[Renton]

Ong you of course realize that all of the current problems with the transportation network are because of peak time congestion and overuse of the roads? How would your free transportation for all go about mitigating these issues?

No more rush hour for those that can afford the Pay. A longer time between leaving home for work and arriving home for those that can't.

No. Companies would shift their working hours from 9-5 to 8-4 7-3 10-6 11-7 etc to make things cheaper for their employees. There would literally be no rush hour, or at least not nearly as sharp of one. Transport trucks would plan their routes to go through major cities at night just to avoid having to pay the higher prices. Yes, middle class drivers would have to pay tolls, but they would save in fuel bills and have way more free time when they don't have to commute 2 hours to work in bumper to bumper traffic. Poor people would definitely carpool more, and I suspect a lot fewer poor people would find it worthwhile to own a car, but I'm not sure it was worth all of the trouble to subsidize single-passenger drivers who can't afford to pay a toll for all of these years.

[rong]

It's not that simple for employers to just change working hours. There'd be huge costs involved. Not to. Mention the fact that people have planned their lives around traditional working hours and that would have to be changed completely.

As for transportation trucks, why don't they travel at night anyway to avoid traffic and reduce fuel costs and time?

[Renton]

As for transportation trucks, why don't they travel at night anyway to avoid traffic and reduce fuel costs and time?

I admit that I felt that the transport truck argument was weak as I was typing it. It would provide slightly more incentive for them to avoid rush hour though. Basically my point is that rush hour as it currently exists would be impossible with peak load pricing. With that level of congestion, tolls could be >$100. We already see an analogue to this with Uber pricing. This doesn't mean that people would regularly have to pay 100 bucks to use a road, it just means that roads would almost never be that congested. Which is a good thing.

When a bottleneck emerges with the current setup, it just goes untreated and gets worse and worse. With private roads, every bottleneck would have a market response. Some other alternate route would get developed to chase the profit signal and the effect would be alleviating the clog and stabilizing the price.


re: hours, yes it would be pretty revolutionary on that front, but I don't see defying tradition as a bad thing. I'm not sure that the costs would be huge. Working hours are for the most part pretty arbitrary, shifting them an hour here or there wouldn't be that momentous of a change. The problem is now there is very little incentive for that to happen.

[OngBonga]

Ong you of course realize that all of the current problems with the transportation network are because of peak time congestion and overuse of the roads? How would your free transportation for all go about mitigating these issues?

idk, I'm the ideas guy, I'll employ someone else to do all the paperwork.

[OngBonga]

I mean I'm working on the assumption that more busses means less cars, assuming people are actually using the bus. If it's free, then they will.

[rong]

I still wouldn't get a bus. It's full of poor people.

[Galapogos]

Get on top, stay on top. Maybe he knows something.

Doubt it though.



This was allegedly made by an AI. I want that to be true.

Bumping this post since there was a thread on reddit about it this morning. Apparently this was created by Google's Image recognition AI. Google set up a feedback loop of the software and this allows you to see what the software is seeing. In the article they are saying since it's a neural network the way it reads an image is something it does on its own rather than following explicit instructions. These images allow the programmers to actually see what the AI is focusing on and ignoring.

I know barely anything about AI but I always liked stuff like this. I always wished I'd taken that direction in school as it's pretty mind-blowing stuff. Anyway, here's the article the reddit thread linked to - http://www.theguardian.com/technolog...heep?CMP=fb_gu

[spoonitnow]

There's already a thread on capitalism and why people who don't agree on it are wrong.

[aubreymcfate]

ugh fuck off Galapagos, i literally just came here to post that link.

newayz, here's another one i wanted to post days ago while skimming through here: http://aeon.co/magazine/psychology/d...inds-together/

"New research puts us on the cusp of brain-to-brain communication. Could the next step spell the end of individual minds?"

This is in response to something Boost posted about the loss of the individual entities in the context of artificial intelligence.

Twitter is a pretty portentous warning of the collective echo chamber to come.

[MadMojoMonkey]

I wonder if freedom of movement / freedom to travel would change with a privatized road system.

My argument about taxation relies on the ability to freely leave that tax district.

***
Businesses are frequently incentivized w/ city tax breaks to have their work shift take place off of rush hour traffic (at least in the St Louis area - in business districts). However, most businesses do not do this, even though the tax cut is significant. The reason I was given at the companies at which I worked was this: Businesses do business with each other, and there is a severe hit to productivity when your business is open but the businesses with which you want to do business are closed.

IDK about any of this, though. It's all hearsay and assumptions to me.

[rong]

Didn't this just bump up the price of ivory and therefore increase the incentive of every poacher to go snipe an elephant?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-33209800

[a500lbgorilla]

Bumping this post since there was a thread on reddit about it this morning. Apparently this was created by Google's Image recognition AI. Google set up a feedback loop of the software and this allows you to see what the software is seeing. In the article they are saying since it's a neural network the way it reads an image is something it does on its own rather than following explicit instructions. These images allow the programmers to actually see what the AI is focusing on and ignoring.

I know barely anything about AI but I always liked stuff like this. I always wished I'd taken that direction in school as it's pretty mind-blowing stuff. Anyway, here's the article the reddit thread linked to - http://www.theguardian.com/technolog...heep?CMP=fb_gu

This is what AI is about - learning more about our I. Not this misguided nonsense that an AI will learn to dominate the world, because that's what we did with our I.

Look at how trippy the image is. Look at how it looks for eyes in everything. Look at how it builds patterns out of nothing in the background and is always looking to make a face (or maybe I'm looking to make a face). I bet we do something like this without even knowing.

[a500lbgorilla]

ugh fuck off Galapagos, i literally just came here to post that link.

newayz, here's another one i wanted to post days ago while skimming through here: http://aeon.co/magazine/psychology/d...inds-together/

"New research puts us on the cusp of brain-to-brain communication. Could the next step spell the end of individual minds?"

This is in response to something Boost posted about the loss of the individual entities in the context of artificial intelligence.

Twitter is a pretty portentous warning of the collective echo chamber to come.

Meh, I'd plug in. Are you even an individual entity? You're more or less a cacophony of simpler brains.

[a500lbgorilla]

Made from a Knight



Made from random noise:

[OngBonga]

I still wouldn't get a bus. It's full of poor people.

Poor people with suntans.

[wufwugy]

Didn't this just bump up the price of ivory and therefore increase the incentive of every poacher to go snipe an elephant?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-33209800

Maybe. I'm not sure how much demand there is for antique ivory.

But as usual, left-wing environmentalism hurts the environment more than the people they're trying to stop.

Here's a neat story: Corey Knowlton won the bid to kill a rhino of an endangered species for ~250k. The proceeds go towards conservation of the species. Environmentalists had protested the bidding event so badly, that many who wanted to bid over 1MM did not partake in the event. This rhino was already an older, non-breeding male who had killed several breeding males, and the only real option for aiding the conservation of the species was to kill him and use the proceeds for good. Of course, the environmentalist left knows nothing about anything, so they did everything they could to stop this.

[spoonitnow]

This is what happens when feelings overtake logic. Everybody gets fucked, even the people doing the fucking.

[spoonitnow]

On Friday, the Army announced that all the women who had attempted to graduate from Ranger School had officially failed to meet the standards, according to a military source.

Ranger School, which grooms the Army’s most elite special operations fighting force, opened its doors to women for the first time this year. Eight of the 20 women who originally entered the school's first co-ed class were allowed to recycle through the program after they fell out in their first go-round. The Friday announcement confirmed this happened again. Three of the eight were invited to take the course over again in late June....

But there is another opinion quietly being voiced as well: that Ranger School is more akin to a rite of passage – an opportunity for men to “thump their chest,” as one Ranger puts it – than a realistic preparation for leading in war. That women can actually make Ranger units more effective. And that the standards that keep them out are outdated....

This argument is less about gender equity than the firm belief that women can make Ranger battalions better. In modern warfare, relations with local populations are crucial, and women Rangers would provide unique value added in places such as Afghanistan or Iraq, where cultural norms often prohibit contact between male soldiers and women. Ranger School also showed women were innovative problem-solvers who offered fresh approaches in the field.

Speaking of feelings overtaking logic.

Innovative problem-solvers lol. Fresh approaches lol. Failing miserably en masse is more like it.

[spoonitnow]

Fun Fact: The US Women’s National Soccer Team lost to the Under 17’s US Boys’ Team 2-8

Go equality.

[OngBonga]

I predict that exactly one person here finds that remotely interesting.

[MadMojoMonkey]

[spoonitnow]

This is me trying to get fresh blood into the commune: http://www.flopturnriver.com/pokerfo...=1#post2239200

[a500lbgorilla]

[JKDS]

There was a patent case at the SCOTUS, and one of the Justices quoted Ben Parker's "With great power, comes great responsibility".

A few months ago, the same justice quoted Dr. Seuss.

Neat

[spoonitnow]

There was a patent case at the SCOTUS, and one of the Justices quoted Ben Parker's "With great power, comes great responsibility".

A few months ago, the same justice quoted Dr. Seuss.

Neat

Glad to know Green Eggs and Fucking Ham is helping to craft policy in the United States.

Then again, that's a step up from how shit normally runs.

[MadMojoMonkey]

Glad to know Green Eggs and Fucking Ham is helping to craft policy in the United States.

Then again, that's a step up from how shit normally runs.

Great. Now I can't read Green Eggs and Ham w/o hearing Samuel Jackson doing the voice-overs.

Wait.

This is much better.

[spoonitnow]

I can't read Green Eggs and Ham

Ikr

[MadMojoMonkey]

Ikr

I haven't tried in years, but I'm sure I could sound out the big words to get through it.

[a500lbgorilla]

Eventually you climb the intellectual mountaintop and find a need to piss off the peak.

[MadMojoMonkey]

Eventually you climb the intellectual mountaintop and find a need to piss off the peak.

That's where volcanoes come from.

Don't piss off the peak. Peak's are sensitive.

[JKDS]

Naw, it was One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish!

http://www.cnn.com/2015/02/25/politi...arbanes-oxley/

[MadMojoMonkey]

Naw, it was One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish!

http://www.cnn.com/2015/02/25/politi...arbanes-oxley/

What a policy. Coast Guard needs to take a lesson from street cops. Cops aren't ever asking criminals to kindly follow them back to the Police Station with the contraband.

Nor should they. You're already a proven criminal in their eyes.
There's every reason to NOT trust you to be a responsible citizen at that point.

***
I'm curious what the time limit is on catch-and-release, now. I mean... it sounds like the fish were still alive when they were thrown back to sea.

[JKDS]

How do you guys feel about Soldiers?

Everyone makes a huge fucking deal about it, like "OMG support our troops" and what not. But it seems forced to me. Like, you can watch Rambo, for instance, and see why supporting the troops matters and was a huge deal. But that was when we had a draft. That was when people were actually forced to go to war. In that case, fuck yeah support the troops. But now, without a draft, I dont see why I should pay them any more respect or give them any more deference than any other public servant.

(that isnt to say we shouldnt have better veteran assistance; just that troops shouldnt be off-limits to talk about critically (or even badmouthingly))

Also, I never hear things like "Support our Volunteer Firefighters"... but I'm ready to actually pounce on anyone who doesnt support them.

[a500lbgorilla]

War is deeply fascinating and emotive. No one can escape how captivating war is. Someone says to admire a warrior and pay them some respect? It's not hard.

[a500lbgorilla]

And I'll play devil's advocate on 'support your firefighters". You probably need a higher mortality rate and greater personal sacrifice while matching the historic public service of a trooper to expect people to be buying firemen drinks and thanking them for their service.

[OngBonga]

Fuck the soliders. They sign on the dotted line, then they go out to other nations and kill people. They can have my contempt, not my respect.

[MadMojoMonkey]

How do you guys feel about Soldiers?

They do a job I am way too much of a lazy coward to even approach.

I never met a soldier that I was really close friends with; I don't have a lot of data to judge.

Fuck the soliders. They sign on the dotted line, then they go out to other nations and kill people. They can have my contempt, not my respect.

:/
I don't like the attitude of judging a group of people with a blanket statement.
Do better, Ong.

I agree with the notion that they did choose their career just like anyone else and, like anyone else, if they're going to expect respect, then they should offer it. The thing is... most of them do exactly that (offer an above average amount of respect right up front).

At worst, I can say that I've met plenty of wanna-be martyrs. They focus on the "putting their life on the line" part too much.
IMO, get over yourself. There are tons of reasons to respect what you do if you are an honest, hard-working person. Tell me about that.

[OngBonga]

I don't like the attitude of judging a group of people with a blanket statement.

I don't like the naivity of kids who think that they are somehow protecting our nation by going to another continent to kill people for daring to fight aggressive invaders.

We're not fighting Nazis anymore. We are the Nazis. Should the German people have shown their soldiers respect during WWII?

[OngBonga]

In fact that's not even a good analogy. Yes the Germans should've respected their soldiers. They had no choice.

[JKDS]

I'm not saying they should get no respect, but rather that it shouldn't be the upmost respect.

Sure, I couldn't be a soldier. But lots of people couldn't be teachers, garbage men, police officers, or family law attorneys. Fact is, Noone is forced to be a soldier right now, so I can only assume that many of them are there by choice. Its certainly dangerous work, life threatening even. But lots of careers have risks, so why is this one in particular so beyond reproach? Police officers are the easier corollary I guess, but I got mixed feelings about them too.

[JKDS]

Also, I'll admit that the only people in any kind of armed service that I've met were nice and good people...whom I respect. I don't think any of them walk on water though.

[MadMojoMonkey]

We are the Nazis.

Ong is a Nazi. Confirmed.

[OngBonga]

Define "good people".

I mean, making a really stupid and naive choice to give up your life to defend your nation's "freedom" on the other side of the world by means of force isn't how I'd define "good".

They are chooising a life of blind obedience. They're no better than dogs.

[OngBonga]

Ong is a Nazi. Confirmed.

This film is historically perfect. Having seen this film many times, I know now what it was like to be around in those times.

[MadMojoMonkey]

Define "good people".

People who are not OngBonga.

I mean, making a really stupid and naive choice to give up your life to defend your nation's "freedom" on the other side of the world by means of force isn't how I'd define "good".

...because you're a Nazi-ISIS-commie who hates getting pwned by freedom-loving Murcans.

obv.

They are chooising a life of blind obedience.

... to freedom.

They're no better than dogs.

Jibbers, now you're attacking dogs, too?

This film is historically perfect. Being a Nazi-ISIS-commie, I know now what it is like to be around in these times.

[MadMojoMonkey]

Seriously, though:

I agree with you that I don't see any credible threats to the American way of life coming from outside of America.

I don't accept the notion that joining the military amounts to "defending our freedom." That's just a talking point that can be made by either side. It is therefore merely an appeal to emotion and not a statement which reflects reality in a helpful or progressive manner. (IMO)


The notion that the military is composed of people who 'blindly follow orders' is silly.

There were a lot of ROTC soldiers in the Engineering and Physics department at Saint Louis University. Many of them came from situations where it was A) their only way to pay for college and B) allowed them to enter the military as an officer - a leadership role.

[a500lbgorilla]

I don't like the naivity of kids who think that they are somehow protecting our nation by going to another continent to kill people for daring to fight aggressive invaders.

We're not fighting Nazis anymore. We are the Nazis. Should the German people have shown their soldiers respect during WWII?

Dan Carlin does an amazing podcast where he talks about how war was romanticized until early into WW1 where people saw war had become something demonic.

In truth, war was always terrible, but in this era of machine guns, tanks, warplanes, submarines, chemical weapons, nuclear bombs.... it's too terrible to even pretend otherwise.

But we ain't done with war, yet.

[a500lbgorilla]

Feg

[Luco]

thumbs up, def worth a watch if the concept of ai is at least semi interesting to you.

Got around to watching ex machina and yeah, not a bad film at all. The one thing I took away from it is that Nathan is a fan of the landing strip

[spoonitnow]

A 2015 National Debt Relief survey of 1,107 adults with credit card debt revealed some interesting differences between the sexes. In the survey, the main difference between men and women was the amount of credit card debt they carried.

For instance, 63 percent of women ages 18 to 24 carried some credit card debt, but only 36 percent of men in that age category had any debt. Similarly, 66 percent of women ages 55 to 64 carried credit card debt, but only 33 percent of men in that age bracket had credit card debt.

I thought that was neat.

[aubreymcfate]

Dan Carlin does an amazing podcast where he talks about how war was romanticized until early into WW1 where people saw war had become something demonic.

In truth, war was always terrible, but in this era of machine guns, tanks, warplanes, submarines, chemical weapons, nuclear bombs.... it's too terrible to even pretend otherwise.

But we ain't done with war, yet.

can you please share the link to that podcast? I've been reading about Ed Bernays and WW1 propaganda, so I'm curious to see how that fits in.

[spoonitnow]

can you please share the link to that podcast? I've been reading about Ed Bernays and WW1 propaganda, so I'm curious to see how that fits in.

Watch the documentary "The Century of Self." It's available online for free.

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Century_of_the_Self

[aubreymcfate]

Already on my to-do list -- thanks

[MadMojoMonkey]

Feg

7 minutes of commentary on the disintegration:



TL;DW
You can actually see the payload capsule tumble away before the vehicle disintegrates.
If it were a manned launch, there is a high probability that the crew would have survived.

SpaceX is still below the average 5% failure rate observed by the international space community.
(I hope I worded that last one correctly.)

[JKDS]

How do ya'll go about picking a doctor?

I'm no longer illusioned into thinking doctors all have talent, and idk how to efficiently find a good one.

[Renton]

WWI podcast is called Blueprint for Armageddon. It's unbelievably long, but excellent.

[OngBonga]

How do ya'll go about picking a doctor?

Two important factors to take into account are -

how easy their name is to pronounce,
and how easy their handwriting is to read.

[OngBonga]

I mean Dr Ulamulubalulula may be the best doctor in town, but I can't keep calling him "mate".

[rong]

Watch the documentary "The Century of Self." It's available online for free.

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Century_of_the_Self

This is great.

[rong]

And on YouTube.

[Galapogos]

Watch the documentary "The Century of Self." It's available online for free.

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Century_of_the_Self

Saw this a few years ago, it's a great watch.

[MadMojoMonkey]

How do ya'll go about picking a doctor?

I'm no longer illusioned into thinking doctors all have talent, and idk how to efficiently find a good one.

I have never done what you are asking. I heard an NPR report about this ~10 years ago.

Ask people you trust what they think of their GP. If that pool is too small, ask anyone you have 2 - 3 minutes with.

I would guess that, while it's an odd question to be asked by a stranger, most people will be comfortable sharing their opinion with you, so long as you're acting professionally (or at least generally "normal").

I wouldn't be at all surprised if there's a web site that amounts to a "rate my doctor" kind of deal.
<bit of searching>
There is a web site to help you choose a doctor in St. Louis area, but I don't think there's anything it could offer me besides names and addresses. It's not like I can verify if any of the reviews are for real, or from remotely sane people.

[aubreymcfate]

http://www.mediaite.com/online/ortho...icans-instead/

"A group of Orthodox Jews hired Mexican day laborers to dress in traditional Jewish garb and protest against the New York City gay pride parade Sunday."

lollllll

[eugmac]

http://www.mediaite.com/online/ortho...icans-instead/

"A group of Orthodox Jews hired Mexican day laborers to dress in traditional Jewish garb and protest against the New York City gay pride parade Sunday."

lollllll

thanks, it made me chuckle

[spoonitnow]

Hey I just want to throw out a quick fuck Obama for making my monthly Obamacare tax payment of about $240 for the most useless health insurance plan you could fucking imagine.

[OngBonga]

Yeah but private health insurance means competition and better quality blah blah fucking blah.

My friend, a former NHS nurse, found it really easy to get work in New Zealand because the NHS is repsected worldwide as health care of the highest quality. They bent over backwards to help her emigrate. They want our nurses.

So we have great health care that is currently paid for by the state. Of course it has its impact on taxation, so it's not like it's free, but $240 a month? That's a lot more than the UK taxpayer is contributing.

Fuck privatisation. Don't just point the finger at Obama. He's just the face.

[Renton]

lol at calling the american healthcare regime privatization.

[spoonitnow]

Yeah but private health insurance means competition and better quality blah blah fucking blah.

My friend, a former NHS nurse, found it really easy to get work in New Zealand because the NHS is repsected worldwide as health care of the highest quality. They bent over backwards to help her emigrate. They want our nurses.

So we have great health care that is currently paid for by the state. Of course it has its impact on taxation, so it's not like it's free, but $240 a month? That's a lot more than the UK taxpayer is contributing.

Fuck privatisation. Don't just point the finger at Obama. He's just the face.

Okay you just confirmed that you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.

[OngBonga]

Just?