Hamartiogonic

Hamartiogonic , 1 day ago

Lithosphere and mantle. Got it. 👍

Hamartiogonic , 4 days ago

Unicycles are clearly more dangerous than skis.

Hamartiogonic , 4 days ago

relevant xkcd

Hamartiogonic , 2 days ago

LOL. Those raid ads baked into the OS were just a cherry on top.

Hamartiogonic , 8 days ago

Yep. That’s the Great Filter concept. Certain stages on the evolutionary path may lead to extinction, and only the smartest species are able to pass the filter unharmed. In our case, the discovery of fossil fuels and nuclear weapons may be those kinds of stages.

Imagine what happens if we pass this filter and become an intergalactic species. Maybe one day we’ll start tinkering with technology capable of destroying a star, galaxy or the entire universe. If we are smart enough to squeeze energy out of the very fabric of space, we might also be dumb enough to cause the entire universe to collapse or something like that.

It’s a proposed solution to the fermi paradox. The idea is that we don’t see aliens out there in the stars, because they all nuked themselves to oblivion at some stage. Maybe they never reached the stars, before they destroyed their home planet. Maybe they blew up their own star and didn’t reach another one in time. Maybe their entire galaxy got sucked into a home-made black hole.

Hamartiogonic , 8 days ago

Will this antimatter reactor consume the entire planet?

Meh, probably not.

Hamartiogonic , 7 days ago

That’s a very good addition. The old filters are still there and any one of them could still come back and bite us. However, when better technology becomes available, the older filters become less and less of a problem. Let’s take the bioweapons as an example. At the moment, we can develop cures and vaccines, but that technology has its limits. Perhaps one day our biotech is advanced enough that stopping a bioweapon from harming the citizens is as trivial as updating some software and changing a few passwords. Likewise, the climate catastrophe becomes less and less of an issue if the species is no longer bound to a single planet, but can also thrive in space.

Hamartiogonic , 8 days ago

”Summer is the best day of the year, and last time it was on a Thursday.”

But seriously though, It’s been very nice and warm for a few weeks now. As long as I can sleep well, I don’t have any complaints.

Hamartiogonic , 9 days ago

As far as I’m concerned, it’s just another “random flu bug”. Most people are vaccinated, so they won’t be getting severe symptoms. Immunocompromised people are in big trouble, but that was also true before 2019. Basically any disease is dangerous to them; has always been.

Hamartiogonic , 9 days ago

Crossing large spans of water was very dangerous, because of storms, getting lost, running out of food etc. Nowadays, crossing large spans of empty space is also very dangerous, but the dangers are a bit different. Regardless, I can see many similarities between crossing the Atlantic ocean in the 1400s and going to the moon 500 years laters.

Hamartiogonic , 7 days ago

You’re right that there are many big differences. Launching a rocket into space could be compared with building a major cathedral back in the day. People did both, but not very often, because those projects are very demanding. Ships were also super expensive, but we built those all the time, so obviously the requirements weren’t quite as high.

Also attitudes have shifted quite a lot in the recent centuries, so losing a few sailors isn’t quite the same as losing an astronaut. Nowadays, safety is taken a lot more seriously which makes the project even more expensive.

Hamartiogonic , 9 days ago

Never had CPU compatibility issues, but I’ve had similar frustrations with power supplies. Some of the strangest glitches I’ve seen were eventually traced back to a cheap PSU. If you hadn’t already found the root cause, I would have recommended swapping the PSU just to make sure.

Hamartiogonic , 14 days ago

But what about cutting steel with a plasma torch? Could you see macroscopic results of particles doing counterintuitive quantum stuff?

Hamartiogonic , 13 days ago

So… no superposition, entanglement, tunneling or teleportation in macroscopic scale. ☹️

Hamartiogonic , 14 days ago

Next try to calculate what it would actually mean to make that much water follow a path like that. My guess is, it’s going to get very spicy.

Hamartiogonic , 16 days ago

Having seen enough exceptions in biology, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone found a multicellular bacterial species that violates everything we know about bacteria. Biology is completely wild, and it’s really hard to come up with a rule or a category that always works and nobody has any problems with it.

Hamartiogonic , 19 days ago

At school, I thought our understanding of chemistry was really good. Years later, I realized that complicated solutions aren’t covered by any of the equations we have. You’re can do fancy calculations, but you’re always stuck with simple solutions and standard conditions. In real life, you have to deal with super messy non-standard stuff all the time.

Top scientists end up developing semi-empirical models, or even particle simulations, and that’s the best we can do right now. Nobody fully trusts those predictions, so we’re still going to need lab experiments before making any big decisions.

The good news is that there’s still so much to discover.

Hamartiogonic , 20 days ago

This is the way. If OP doesn’t like olives, that just leaves more for the rest of us. It’s a win-win for everyone.

Hamartiogonic , 21 days ago

Really? I should totally give it a go some time. Sounds like the ideal life hack for me.

Hamartiogonic , 20 days ago

Our perception of it is also highly distorted due to the bubble we live in. Chinese are living in a different kind of bubble where everyone can more or less understand each other, as long as they stick to the written form. The languages may be different, but they are written using the same system, which makes communication possible. Also, the Great Firewall of China keeps Chinese people inside that bubble and foreigners outside it.

Hamartiogonic , 26 days ago (edited 26 days ago)

Remember those mobile games where you can watch ads to get some gold and diamonds or simply pay for them with real money? Well, I can imagine a dystopian future where that logic has been applied to everything.

Wanna press an elevator button? Pay with shopping center diamonds or watch this quick ad.

Wanna try on this shirt before buying it? Ads. Is this made of cotton? Ads.

Take the escalator to the next floor? Ads.

Wanna check the info screen to figure out where you can find a restaurant in this shopping center? Ads.

Wanna unlock different parts of the menu? Ads. Wanna see the prices too? Ads. Allergens? Ads again.

Need to go to the toilet? Ads. Want some toilet paper? More ads.

If you encounter this literally every 30 seconds, spending some money on those shopping center diamonds suddenly becomes a very appealing idea.

On the outside of the mall you see a punk looking guy with a Molotov cocktail in his hand. You feel a sudden urge to join in whatever he is up to.

Anyway, if you want some more suffering and sadness, simply dump the first lines to GPT and ask it to take this dystopia to its logical conclusion. It could get pretty wild.

Hamartiogonic , 20 days ago

I think it is also related to the economy as a whole. While the pandemic was dragging on and on, inflation got much higher and central banks responded by increasing the interest rates. As a result, investors no longer had access to infinite free money.

Turns out, there are lots of companies that relied on constant funding instead of actual revenue. Those companies are undergoing some major changes at the moment.

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

It should be called the WISHFUL list. It stands for “Wildly Improbable Scenarios Happening Unbelievably Far in the Unseen Later”.

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

This is the way.

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

LOL. Far in the unseen later, it is then.

Hamartiogonic , 24 days ago

Congrats!

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

Selection bias. There’s plenty of overlap between the groups of people who know about it, care about it, use FOSS, use Lemmy etc. It’s basically a prominent characteristic of the stereotypical Lemmy user. We’re still a small and surprisingly homogenous group of people. If Lemmy ever grows like Mastodon, you’ll begin to see more diversity.

There’s also something you could call the “fish out of water” bias. If you’re not LGBT, you’ll suddenly notice how many LGBT people there are on Mastodon. If you’re not into ML, you’re going to notice the people who are.

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

So, you mean music composed before 1800? Bach and Mozart should be fine, whereas Beethoven is way too modern.

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

I’ve noticed that the search results are getting less and less relevant to what I’m actually looking for. I guess one day the search bar will disappear like the headphone jack of the iPhone.

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

Now I’m really curious. How do you read those comments?

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

‘The online instructions for restricting data access are very complex and confusing, and the steps required are scattered in different places. There’s no clear direction on whether to go to the app settings, the central settings – or even both,’ says Amel Bourdoucen, a doctoral researcher at Aalto.

Sounds like there’s some dark pattern BS going on with those settings.

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

Item duplication glitch, infinite gold, infinite health potions etc. Post scarcity world, here we come!

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

As soon as we’ve managed to make a computer that can simulate an entire brain in real time. Who knows how many decades or even centuries will that take.

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

That’s a lot like the papers that come with physical products, such as cameras or keyboards. This category of advertising isn’t particularly offensive IMO, and it’s also fairly relevant as opposed to most online ads.

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

I don’t think you mentioned the announcements often heard in shopping centers. As long as your ears work, you’ll be exposed to these ads.

Hamartiogonic , 2 months ago

The phone you use doesn’t say anything about your tech insights. Why should it?

However, it may tell you something about the kinds of things the person values. If price matters, you’ll go with the cheapest Android. If features matter, you’ll go with a flagship Android. If privacy matters, you’ll get a specific Android phone and install GrapheneOS on it.

There are also a variety of reasons for getting an iPhone, and they may reflect your values in some way.

Hamartiogonic , 2 months ago

Some people like the looks. Some people buy one because it serves as a status symbol. Some people just go with the flow and buy one, simply because everyone else already has one. Some people appreciate the coherent UI. Some people already use various other Apple products and services, so they prefer to get the synergy of also using an iPhone.

I don’t really care much about any of those things, but I have some special software and hardware that only works with vanilla or OEM Android and iOS. Trust me, I tried lots of different tweaks and hacks, but eventually had to face the harsh reality that nowadays things are specifically designed to prevent people like me from doing whatever I want. If things had worked with Lineage or Graphene, I would obviously be using those instead. Since that isn’t the case, I had to pick the least offensive one from a list of two awful options. This decisions shows that I value the compatibility that comes with an iPhone.

I’m sure there are lots of other reasons too.

Hamartiogonic , 2 months ago

If we narrow it down to all organic life on the planet, the answer is: humans.

Hamartiogonic , 2 months ago

You’re right, that it would be bad for humans. I’m just looking at the big picture and what would good for it in the long run.

Humans already make similar decisions anyway. Certain part of the population will suffer so that another one can benefit. Occasionally, these sorts of decisions also lead to deaths. In an even larger scale, humans have also decided that certain animals and plants can suffer so that humans may thrive. Imagine if the ecosystem as a whole could make a decision like this about itself. Do you think the it would keep humanity, remove it entirely or maybe trim it down a bit?

But seriously though, humans are here to stay for the time being, and I prefer to keep it that way. Unlike Linkola, I’m in no hurry to see disasters wipe out a portion of humanity.

Hamartiogonic , 2 months ago

What kind of theory do you recommend?

Hamartiogonic , 2 months ago

See also: Nothing to hide argument

Hamartiogonic , 2 months ago

Where do we draw the line what is or isn’t a religion? If you have definition, try applying it to Pastafarianism, Communism, Budhism and a bunch of other ideas and practices from Asia.

Personally, I prefer to go with a super simple and completely arbitrary list definition. If it’s on my secret list, it’s a religion. If not, it’s a philosophy.

Hamartiogonic , 2 months ago

Compound interest.

Let’s say you need to borrow 5000 € for your first car, but you have only 700 €. First, you’ll need to find a lender who is willing to share the risk with you. Then, you form a joint stock company (Tom’s Volvo C30 2008 incorporated), where you own 7/50 of the car and the other party owns the rest. When you have some more money, you can buy some more stocks. One day, you’ll own the whole car and the lender has all of their money back.

Hamartiogonic , 2 months ago

The idea is to avoid the expense spiraling out of control due to exponential growth.

In order to motivate your business partner, you should have a contract that defines the price of the stocks in a favorable way. It’s like buying and selling really. The lender pays 4300 € for the car, and sells it at a higher price, such as 4600 €.

Hamartiogonic , 2 months ago

Well, now that taking a loan is fast and easy, people tend to spend the money they don’t have and buy the things they can’t afford. Having some sort of a speed bump along the way should make people think a little more and avoid getting into unnecessary debt.

Hamartiogonic , 2 months ago

UAZ Cabriolet

It’s clearly the worst car money can buy. Before starting the engine, you need to check which liquids have leaked out and add some accordingly. Pretty much anything and everything can and will leak. Who needs a gym when just turning the wheel is a workout. If you want to listen to hardbass while driving, you need to bring your own stereo with you since this car doesn’t have one. It’s the only car that can be improved by a mechanical failure. When the engine or transmission inevitably dies, you’re finally free from this torment.

0/10, would not recommend

Hamartiogonic , 2 months ago

Already exists.

Hamartiogonic , 1 month ago

What about the table of nuclides? IMO that’s the best way to list elements in a logically consistent manner. The trouble is, nature is a messy kraken that just won’t fit neatly into a shoe box. You can try to squeeze it in, but the lid won’t close because there are always a few tentacles sticking out.