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8 months agoYou’re being pedantic, they don’t care as it pertains to whether they will provide you with service. They do care so that they can match yours and other people’s requests.
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Cake day: June 4th, 2025
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The difference in what I am saying and what you are saying is scale and you are completely ignoring the rest of my argument. The scale at which you would have to be a minority for this to impact you significantly is somewhere in the 1-5% range (as in your minority is only this percentage of the local population) with the assumption that the other 95-99% are opposed to you. This is why Uber providing this as an option is different from the cases which the Civil Rights Act was based around. Hell, this is why scabs are effective against unions as well.
A diner not serving black people is impactful because a handful of people are the business owners and are effectively gating you out. Uber allowing those people to select only a specific preference means that anyone who doesn’t set restrictions will break that system and actually benefit from it (more business).
This also goes both ways and is potentially international, Japanese could choose not to serve non-Japanese, a black person could choose not to serve white people for comfort or security.
You’re fundamentally not understanding why Uber allowing people to make this decision is not the same as 1960’s segregation.
But that’s not how Uber works, Uber pairs drivers with riders and has no guarantee for service even now. If I open my app and there are not drivers available then no service will be provided, this isn’t Uber discriminating.
Uber doesn’t care what your race, gender, or political leaning is, they want to provide you the service you want. So long as the option goes both ways this only hurts the people who opt into the program, not everyone else. The only way this could hurt others would be if those who choose to opt in (as in they only want a certain thing) get priority in the scheduling or if you live somewhere where you are the overwhelming minority.
In the first example, if you say you only want female riders so the system sends you every woman that comes into the system instead of putting you in the same queue as everyone else but skipping you if the next client doesn’t match your preference. In this case you are being skipped in the allocation of riders and actually missing opportunities due to your preference.
In the second example, if you are still living in a sun down town then getting Uber rides is probably not your biggest problem.
Even now, Uber drivers are independent contractors and can cancel service whenever they want. If the driver pulls up and thinks you’re sketchy they can cancel the ride, there is no obligation.
I mean, as a company whose business is pairing riders with drivers, it begs the question why this isn’t already an option so long as drivers can also choose not to drive for people flagged as a certain way. If a MAGA person only wants white people driving for them then that will reduce the effectiveness of the app for them, provides service for someone who otherwise would be difficult as a customer, and it prevents them from harassing or bothering potential victims.
If I want to, as a driver or rider, I think I should be able to choose not to be driven or ride with someone who has been flagged by others as overly visible. That might mean someone who won’t shut up about MAGA while I or they drive, it might be someone who has 15 bumper stickers about their beliefs, or it might be someone who has their car wrapped with Hatsune Miku. The consequence of this decision might mean that I have to wait an extra 15 min for a ride or it might mean that because of my actions people no longer wish to ride with me.
Yes, I think that’s a good idea.
I don’t think it’s technically discrimination. Uber is a middle man business which pairs independent contractors with paying customers. If the customers or contractors have a preference then all it’s doing are matching those preferences.
More likely than not this will actually lead to those who use this option to have substandard service (either slower response or less available rides) than those who do not.
Men would only choose their riders gender for bigotry reasons
That’s not necessarily true though. Many men also feel more comfortable with another man in a variety of situations. Prostate exam, counseling, and barber are all good examples. Some guys are just super awkward with women and might not want to feel awkward while paying for a ride. Hell with the severity an accusation of wrong doing can have some men might not want to ride solo with a woman they don’t know.
The same goes for women, not all women choosing this setting are doing so for safety, sometimes people have a preference. Uber is organizing willing independent contractors to the preference of paying customers. If the customer states they want a specific gender as their driver I don’t see why that would be a problem so long as both parties are fine with that.
First of all, it’s NY State, not NYC, and Article 35.10 of the Penal Code says you are allowed to use physical force for self-defense or in the defense of others, but the very next clause is 35.15 which says that you have a duty to retreat unless there is immediate danger.
In a NY court of law you could argue that you were acting in the defense of others, but you would not be able to prove that there was imminent danger.
In no court in the world would you be able to say you were acting in self-defense while acting from 6000 km away.
stop using chat gpt to argue
I’ve never used ChatGPT in my life, you can shove your accusations where the sun doesn’t shine.
30 million acres of land is used to grow ethanol that is mixed into petrol
The majority of ethanol based crop production comes from growing corn in the Midwest, specifically Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, and Indiana. Ranked by population density that’s:
- Nebraska #43
- Kansas #41
- Iowa #36
- Missouri #28
- Indiana #17
- Illinois # 12
By percentage of the US population that’s
- Nebraska @ 0.5%
- Kansas @ 0.8%
- Iowa @ 0.9%
- Missouri @ 1.8%
- Indiana @ 2%
- Illinois @ 3.7%
There are practical reasons why we typically try to generate power close to where it will be used. Yes, theoretically you can realistically supply power up to 3000 miles away, but most power plants only provide power to around 500 miles away. Yes we could cover the Corn Belt with solar panels and then wire it to the coasts, but doing so has it’s own risks and drawbacks. Ethanol agriculture makes sense where it is because the population density is so low and both corn and ethanol can be shipped with relatively low loss.
As for batteries, they are recyclable (as the video goes into). They do add to the cost of renewables but not so much that they cancel out having to constantly mine coal and set it on fire to never be used again
I’m not arguing that they aren’t recyclable but rather they aren’t accessible at the volume needed. A quick google search said that current utility scale battery storage exceeds 26 GW (10^9), but only represents 2% of total generating capacity. To provide power for approximately half the day, based on our previous math, we would need need ~7x10^11 W.
Just so my math is clear from the beginning, 17x10^12 W / 2 (half the day) / 12 (hours per half day) = 7x10^11 W of battery which is 27 times more than we currently have.
Renewables aren’t the “cheapest form of power generation”, they are the “cheapest form of new power generation”. It is cheaper to keep running existing gas-fired and nuclear power stations until they reach EOL than it is to tear them down prematurely and replace them with solar. A large number of power stations are rapidly reaching EOL and it’s very important that we don’t build any more coal-fired power plants right now
I think this is a fair and nuanced point. In my opinion the solution is not one singular option, such as 100% solar, but a mix of options which might include some percentage of non-renewable energy. I think reduction of non-renewable should be the goal, but switching 100% to renewable does not seem feasible to me.
Yeah, the video is 1.5 hours long. I don’t care how good you found it to be, I’m just not going to watch that long of a video, you need to convey what is important in the video through written dialogue or else you may as well not use it. While I did make a mistake in my math my fundamental point is still true, the video’s point was entirely based on scaling renewable power usage for cars to all power usage and the math just doesn’t provide a sound basis for it.
The extra electricity needed for EVs is zero or maybe even negative
That’s unlikely to be the case, the US already does use batteries in power production and the amount more we would need to switch all US power to solar would be astonishingly high.
Power plants can’t react to the amount of power needed at any time and they get inefficient trying
They can’t react in the minute by minute basis, but they do react to usage. Most coal fired plants only operate at about 50% capacity most of the time and bring on reactors to match the predicted power usage curve. When building a power curve profile the power company typically takes into account constant power as a baseline (solar and hydro being always on during the hours it is active and the power output of a given number of reactors is relatively set). Power is then supplemented with smaller generation sites which might use natural gas or even petroleum products. The smaller sites are far less efficient and make less power, but the name of the game when making power is making sure you always have enough for demand.
Let’s say it’s peak day, 25 solar farms are making 675 MW right now, each coal plant reactor can make 500 MW and the demand right now is 1250 MW. You start up your natural gas turbine plant to make up the difference during peak day, but as the sun goes down you start up reactor 2 and 3. As reactor 2 and 3 get going the power usage goes up to 1600 as people come home and the solar farms stop generating power so you continue using your turbine plant but also start drawing from your batteries. Once reactor 2 and 3 are up and running you might stop using your turbine and keep drawing from your batteries, but when people go to sleep the power usage drops to 700 MW. Now power usage has dropped but you keep the reactors going for a while or begin to shut them down (they will still make some power as they shutdown) to recharge the batteries.
All these numbers are hypothetical, but it’s a description of how the process works.
I worked the problem a different way, first of all I evaluated both ends of both spectrum (2.2-5.2 trillion for adding cars to get the number of solar farms needed and 5-10 acres per MW rating, this is how I built my range). I believe I have an error in the number of solar farms needed (2-2.5 million farms in my original post), but I have not been able to replicate my math that got me the error. I made this post in sections and at some point realized that 27 MW doesn’t make 648 MWh, but I might have missed switching it out somewhere to get the math I got.
Rerunning the math I took the amount produced and needed (~17 trillion Wh) and divided it by the production for one 27 MW site (150 MWh) to get the number of plants and then multiplied that by 27x10.
17x10^12 / 150x10^6 x 27 x 10 = 30,600,000 or 30.6 million acres.
All that aside we are still talking about 75x more land usage before we talk about time zones, day night cycles, distribution of the panels, etc. The big counterpoint that people seem to have is batteries, but we already use batteries and the amount more we would need to provide 24 hour coverage with just solar would be astonishing.
Market forces push business decisions, the only way solar power would be cheaper for the consumer is if it was also cheaper for the business. If solar was realistically cheaper then power production facilities then corporations would be switching to it and probably not drop our end costs because that would just be extra profit. Whether it’s a lack of battery capability, unattainable capital costs, lack of reliability, or something else at play, solar power would not be cheaper for the end user or else corporations would be switching to it.
EDIT: Good work on your math.
You literally just reshared the same video the guy I’m responding to shared in the post I am responding to. Obviously you didn’t read anything.
Okay, so I’ve double-checked all the most important numbers you’ve used. One thing I’ve noticed is that Alec compared the land-use of ethanol and solar power, but our fuel is only 10% ethanol. Even then though that doesn’t explain the whole number you got to.
As I said in my post, this guy is talking about fuel for cars, not the entire power usage
With 270 million acres, and 1mW for every 10 acres, that’s 27 million mW (648 trillion Wh a day). Far more than what you say is needed for all cars to be electric
I basically skipped over your 3rd and 4th paragraph
That is literally what I said in paragraph 3 “The US currently has ~12.5k utility scale electric power plants, to replace those with solar and switch all cars to electric you would need ~2-2.5 million solar farms the size represented in the video.”
America consumes 25,000tWh of energy per year (about 7Twh per day)
My research said the US produces 11 trillion Wh per day and said that if all US vehicles were electric it would require 2.2-5.5 trillion Wh more per day. Looking at consumption is important, but looking at production is more accurate. Some electricity is sold or wasted, but that’s to ensure demand is met when the grid sees a spike in usage.
27 million mW (648 trillion Wh a day)
You must have skipped paragraph 2 as well. A 27 MW solar plant is rated as such because that is the maximum instantaneous power outout, but most places only have ~16 hours of sunlight and won’t be running at 27 MW for all 16 hours. As such a 27 MW solar farm will only make ~130-150 MWh/day.
I’m not gonna watch the full hour and a half, but I skimmed through to make sure his message was at least mostly consistent. This guy is talking about renewable energy for cars and vaguely extrapolates that to all energy requirements.
Doing a quick Google search came up with 2.2-5.2 trillion watt-hours as the amount of energy needed if all US vehicles were electric. Currently the US generates ~11 trillion watt-hours per day so this would increase that amount ~20-50%. In this video the guy mentioned a 27 megawatt solar farm (~130-150 MWh/day), but a large coal plant generates 15-24k MWh/day (500-1000 MW instantaneous).
The US currently has ~12.5k utility scale electric power plants, to replace those with solar and switch all cars to electric you would need ~2-2.5 million solar farms the size represented in the video.
The industry standard is that each megawatt a solar farm is rated takes 5-10 acres. For nuclear that value is ~0.8 acres/megawatt and for coal it’s ~0.64 acres/megawatt. While large power plants generate ~500-1000 MW they vary in size dramatically so the actual average is closer to 50 MW per plant. By that math, the current total land for existing plants should be ~400,000 acres but the equivalent if we switched to 100% solar power would be 270-675 million acres of land.
I’m not saying that renewables are bad or that we shouldn’t pursue them, I’m also not arguing that we should all hold on to gas burning cars, but there is not compelling enough evidence that switching to 100% renewable energy would be cheaper.
EDIT: The estimates here don’t include things like the coal mines included in them but it also doesn’t take into account the production of panels, batteries, or the component materials in either of them such as lithium mines. I think solar probably wins out when comparing just that side, but their land usage alone likely tips things.
I’ll stop playing before that happens
1·9 months agoBecause it’s Nebraska police and they’re always feared for their life.
From what I understand the Grand Jury reviews whether there is enough evidence to go forward with an indictment, not whether someone is guilty or not. I did a bit of digging and this event occurred Feb 6, 2024, and the Columbus Nebraska police did not start regularly wearing body cams until March 30, 2025. So that’s what, 3 officers word vs 2 parents of the deceased? At the end of the day there probably just wasn’t enough evidence. The Grand Jury trial was for prosecution by the State AG’s office against the Columbus Police officers. Government prosecutors typically won’t take a case to trial unless they are certain they will win, that’s why they have something like a 95% trial success rate, not because they are good prosecutors but because they drop any they aren’t certain of.
You’re just attacking me, not my argument
You skipped the whole counter argument (comparing to scabs and unions) that this lacks the social structure to support that behavior. If you tried to open a business that wasn’t racist then the racist people would come and threaten you, this isn’t happening with the Uber situation.
The thing is that Uber is not performing any discrimination, they are enabling other people to discriminate against each other and attempting to still provide service through it. Claiming that Uber is discriminating is functionally not true.