It’s beginning… 😱
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/If_Anyone_Builds_It,_Everyone_Dies

Users see the word “Tesla” and hit the down arrow without considering context or data. Tesla is a terrible company, and Musk is an egotistical, racist manbaby; those aren’t the only reasons why I won’t buy a Tesla, but they are a big part. The truth is that every big automobile manufacturer is bad when it comes to infotainment user experience and data privacy.

I won’t buy a Tesla, and most people I know won’t either. But when it comes to the US auto market, Tesla is consistently rated as one of the best user infotainment experiences, specifically because of the things you mentioned. I know someone who bought the 2026 Nissan Leaf, and they love it. I’ve ridden in it a lot and I think it’s a great car… except for the user experience. Every time the car is turned on a pop up covers most of the console advertising satellite radio subscriptions. There’s no way to disable it. Nissan is widely known to be the worst when it comes to user privacy, too.

Slate has my attention and I want them to disrupt the market. I’m considering buying one for my next vehicle, with the range being the only thing that hasn’t locked in my decision yet. I take several long (500+ miles) trips each year, and I would prefer to avoid having to use Tesla superchargers as there aren’t any other fast DC chargers along the route.

I have the same problem, and often wake up unexpectedly in the middle of the night. Sometimes I can fall back asleep quickly, sometimes I am up for a couple hours, occasionally I won’t get back to sleep at all. Whenever it happens it ruins my energy and mood the following day. It started to impact my energy level to where I couldn’t exercise the way I used to. I’d become fatigued so easily that I could barely make it through my routine. Sometimes I wake up with my joints and muscles feeling so sore that I could swear I was beaten with a stick while sleeping. I started gaining a lot of weight despite no changes to my diet. My mood and brain fog were the worse they’ve ever been. I had maybe one “good” day every month or so.

A coworker and I were sharing our gripes about getting older, and I mentioned my sleep problems and the impact to my quality of life. They had gone through the same thing years ago, and ended up being diagnosed with severe sleep apnea; they recommended I get tested for sleep apnea, too. I talked to my doctor and scheduled a sleep study; turns out I also have severe sleep apnea.

If you have any of the sleep problems like me, then I recommend you talk to your doctor about it. Here’s a few things to keep in mind:

• Insist on an in-lab study. Your sleep specialist may try to have you do an at-home test, but those are inaccurate and unreliable. An in-lab study will provide better data.
• When you receive your results, make sure they’re evaluated using the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) guidelines, not the insurance industry guidelines. My first sleep specialist diagnosed me with mild sleep apnea and said I didn’t qualify for treatment. Poor sleep was affecting every aspect of my health and daily life, so I sought a second opinion from an independent sleep specialist who reviewed the same test results and concluded that I had severe sleep apnea; they said insurance industry guidelines underestimate the severity of most apnea patients. Getting that second opinion made a significant difference in receiving the treatment I needed.
• If you do end up needing a CPAP, research which masks work best for the position and how often you turn over in your sleep.

I’m not sure about plasma because I’m not a donor; I only know how much you can make in this area from coworkers who donate twice a week.

Back when I used to donate platelets, I definitely noticed that I wasn’t able to work out as hard and became fatigued more easily for a day or two afterward. I would usually eat a lot of beans and nuts, drink lots of water, and take a multi-vitamin right after my donation to help replenish my lost platelets. It’s likely something similar for blood plasma: lots of water, protein, iron/zinc/copper.

In my area you can make over $400/month selling your plasma.

Whole blood is not sold for profit, but organizations do charge hospitals a handling fee to cover operational costs… but I just realized as I was typing this that you aren’t talking about the organizations that collect blood, but the hospitals.

I looked up what it generally costs for a one-unit (1pt, ~470ml) blood transfusion, and it’s over $2000! I’d like to think that all the blood and platelet donations I’ve made over the years had saved lives, which objectively they probably did. But now knowing how much hospitals and insurance companies are profiting off of the act of donating makes it feel less like a selfless act of compassion and more like cattle being herded into a milking parlor.

I used to donate platelets every two weeks, but I haven’t gone in a few years. The last time I went was beginning of 2024; at that time they still asked all the same questions.

Thank you for your kind words. I’m hopeful that the little girl pulls through and gets the chance to grow up in our home; I wish I could give the same chance to every cat.

I hope that I am wrong about this, but I am not optimistic about Talarico.

He said all the right things to position himself as not just a progressive candidate, but as a christian candidate. White, male, middle aged, handsome, well spoken, seemingly levelheaded, and gives off strong Mr. Rogers vibes. Those things make him comparatively more palatable than most other democratic candidates, especially in Texas.

However, the democrats have had more than a handful of bad actors and turncoats in recent years. Candidates that talk the blue talk and walk the blue walk, but once they take office they quickly turn face. Sinema, Fetterman, Gillibrand, Robin Webb; not an exhaustive list of democrats that turned their backs to the rhetoric and policies that got them elected, but their the ones that spring to my mind first. Schumer, Jeffries, Pelosi, and a host of others could be rightly accused of actively aiding the republican-led undermining of the rule of law (and civil rights) while in office.

The Streisand effect has a long history of backfiring on public officials, so much so that it’s not too far of a stretch to wonder if the administration banked on the FCC debacle to elevate Talarico. To be clear, I’m not entirely pessimistic about Talarico; I want to believe that there are still good people who want to get into public service for the right reasons. I’m just not optimistic because he’s almost too good. Running a sleeper candidate against one of the stronger progressive voices in congress (who frequently and loudly called out the GOP’s bullshit) is exactly the kind of thing that the far-right think tanks would do.

Some American grocery stores already tested the waters by posting armed guards in its stores. This article is a few years old, but the precedent stands.
https://retailwire.com/discussion/hy-vee-creates-its-own-armed-security-squad-to-deter-crime/

Hy-Vee last week announced the introduction of an in-house armed security team to manage theft and in-store disturbances.

The Midwest grocery chain said in a statement that it has long worked with third-party contractors or off-duty law enforcement that work in a security capacity. The goal of bringing it in-house is “to create a consistent look for the security team and consistent approach to customer service and security across all [its] stores.”

It was supposed to be once the bread and circuses became unaffordable, but we’re all so overworked that we don’t have the energy to punch up.

I relate to this. I didn’t have many people I could rely on growing up, though I didn’t recognize it at the time. It left me with a lot of doubt about myself and about others. I often wonder who I might’ve been if genuine human connection had come more naturally, if I hadn’t learned to see myself in such a harsh light.

Right? I saw the meme, chuckled because I relate, but then I saw those bricks. Immediately looked up local gardening and hardware supply store to see if they have them in stock. This is EXACTLY what I need for my gardens.

This is a great article that breaks down land use.

https://ourworldindata.org/global-land-for-agriculture

44% of habitable land is used for human agriculture. Most of that is used for livestock. One thousand years ago, only 4% of habitable land was used for human agriculture. Humans are the leading cause of habitat loss, which has lead to the fastest decline in biodiversity and ecological stability in history. Modern agriculture is one of the largest contributors to our climate and chemical problems, too.

What you’re describing isn’t really a failure of the education system. It’s a reflection of the average American mindset. I was born in the US and grew up in the public school system. I loved math and science, and while I struggled with the rules of grammar, I still loved reading. I have always had a love of learning new things.

But most people aren’t like that. Not just in America, but across the world. A true love of learning is rare, and I think that’s because learning is hard. It requires humility, effort, and the being able to admit that one might be wrong. It means questioning long held beliefs and sometimes changing parts of yourself completely. That’s a deeply uncomfortable prospect and many people avoid it.

I think most people fall sleep while leaning on the third tier of Maslow’s pyramid (belonging and social identity.) The next level, where self-reflection and self-actualization begins, is hard to climb because it means hanging question marks on their long-held ideas and beliefs. They choose the safety of clinging to comfort and routine.

The current controversy over dismantling the US Department of Education is a complex issue that can’t be fully unpacked in a short reply on the internet. But in my view, what’s driving the American zeitgeist toward authoritarianism and anti-intellectualism is this resistance to growth and change. Internalizing new ideas means re-evaluating what you’ve always believed. For many, that feels like a threat. And instead of rising to meet the challenge, they’d rather pull everything down to their level, where they feel safe.

But, at least for me, the climb is worth it. Continuing to learn means accepting discomfort. It means growing past who you were in order to become someone better. It’s how we find purpose, empathy, and a deeper understanding of what it means to be alive.

The spacecraft uses radioisotope thermoelectric generators. It converts the heat generated by radioactive decay of plutonium into electricity. Engineers have been able to keep it working all this time by selectively powering down unused systems.

I’ll take “Hyperbolic & Catastrophic Exaggerations” for $400, Alex.
I’m pretty sure you’re reply is tongue-in-cheek, but that did get me thinking how long it would take to actually destroy the Moon by mining.

Let’s say we used mass drivers to launch 1000kg of material from the Moon to the Earth every second, non stop, until the Moon was completely dismantled. The moon has a mass somewhere around 7.35×10²² kilograms. Dividing the Moon’s mass by the rate of removal, we get Time=7.35×10¹⁹seconds. Divide that by 35,536,000 seconds in a year, and it would take us about 2.33 trillion years to dismantle the moon.

Considering how the Earth only has, maybe, a billion years until the Sun’s natural life cycle makes life on Earth impossible, I’d wager that we’re good. Drill baby, drill.

I feel this. There was one time where I was playing metal over my speakers, but I was the only one in the office and I was not playing it loudly. After a while a security guard was doing rounds and asked me “what the hell” I was listening to. “Cattle Decapitation,” I said, and they wrinkled their nose like someone shat in the trashcan and went on about how they can’t how anyone would like “that stuff” – I shrugged and said me neither and got back to my work.

I get the Tesla hate, I’m also not a fan of Musk and his antics, but can you share a source that says Tesla are inherently worse in crashes than other vehicles? The NHTSA gives overall 5-star safety ratings to Teslas, the highest score possible; the leader of the NHTSA is notoriously anti-Tesla (because of Musk’s antics), and is on record saying that she wants to reign him and the company in (and rightfully so).

From this article: https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/18/business/why-do-people-keep-crashing-teslas/index.html

The Highway Loss Data Institute, a US-based organization funded by the insurance industry, has not found higher crash rates for Tesla vehicles or other EVs more broadly based on overall insurance claims. Teslas do tend to have higher claim costs, though, according to the HLDI.

The article goes on to say that research indicates that the likely cause of a higher rate of EV crashes is drivers 1) not being accustomed to the differences between EV and ICE vehicle handling, and 2) EVs overall having more speed and power than ICE vehicles.

there is a long-established connection between horsepower and the frequency and amount of insurance claims. Fast cars hit things more often and they hit them harder, leading to more – and more severe – crashes. Added to this, EVs lack the usual engine sounds that go along with rapid acceleration and high speeds, so it’s conceivable drivers are less aware of how fast they’re going.

I’m interested in learning more about how EV crashes seem to be worse.

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If only; that would be some tasty irony for a theology degree-holding judge