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InitialsDiceBearhttps://github.com/dicebear/dicebearhttps://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/„Initials” (https://github.com/dicebear/dicebear) by „DiceBear”, licensed under „CC0 1.0” (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)TA
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293
Joined
2 yr. ago

  • New York City has also banned plastic bags since 2020. I was skeptical about the ban at first, because by measure of material weight, bags are but a small fraction of plastic waste. Thin film is just too efficient in terms of use-per-weight ratio. I also thought anyone who didn't want to use plastic bags already had the option to bring their own reusable bags with them.

    My newfound appreciation for the ban is that not only does it divert the use of plastic material, but it forces a change in the public perception around plastic use itself. Sure, you could bring your own bags, but it felt awkward because no one else did. You felt like you were inconveniencing the cashiers and other shoppers by breaking the routine, as if you were asking for special treatment. But now it's perfectly normal! You want to carry that bag of potatoes in your arms without an external bag? Go right ahead. You want to run home carrying a jug of milk dripping condensation on the pavement? Doesn't make you look like a crazy person! All thanks to the ban. Single action by the government on behalf of the collective has achieved what collective action by many single individuals could not have.

  • KM3-230213A is an ultra-energetic (220PeV) neutrino event recorded by the Cubic Kilometre Neutrino Telescope (KM3NeT) on the bottom of the Mediterranean sea. The telescope consists of thousands of photomultiplier sensors suspended in the water, watching for Cherenkov radiation of the decay particles resulting from the rare collision of a neutrino with the inside of the Earth. There is no known cosmic mechanism how a neutrino so energetic could have come to be.

    This meme proposes the hijinks of Apu as an alternative explanation of how all those blue-sensitive photomultipliers got activated (saturated even) in a straight line going from bottom up all at once.

  • New York City reporting in, can confirm the subways have been plastered in Mullvad ads for months. I'm so glad I switched away last year, so that at least I know none of my money is used to spam my own eyeballs. Though in some sense it is nice that VPNs are common in public discourse now.

  • it's not clear that he's following Monty Hall rules

    Whenever I see a badly-specified Monty Hall Problem, I always imagine the host saying something like "Oh, you want to pick door number 1? Well, guess what - the car was behind door number 3 all along! You get nothing but a goat!" And only when you initially pick a door with the car does the host ask "Are you sure you wouldn't rather switch to door number 2? Look, there is even a goat behind door number 3!" Switching doors 100% gurantees you get a goat... or 50% silver balls in this case.

  • Beautifully written!

    I think the probabilities cancel out?

    My conclusion as well. Except that since Jigsaw has taken one gold ball out, door 2 must have slightly better chance of gold ball remaining on average (75% vs 72.2%?).

  • Don't understand why it wasn't done this way in the first place. RCV was approved as a New York City Charter amendment by a voter initiative in 2019, but only applies to primary city elections, not general. You'd think procedurally it would be easier to justify altering the general election process that the Constitution actually applies to, rather than what is technically internal business of independent private organizations (the Democratic and the Republican parties).

  • [deleted]

    Jump
  • This. Full disk encryption worked on Linux long before TPM, and works perfectly fine now still. TPM to me seems only additionally effective in a narrow range of "evil maid" attack scenarios where your (unencrypted, unsigned) bootloader is modified at rest, such as to steal your disk encryption key later. However A) I cannot afford to hire a maid, let alone one also skilled in editing Linux initramfs images and B) I don't see TPM evangelists check their keyboard USB cable for in-line hardware sniffers every single time they step away from their desk.

  • fight FOR the left in primaries, vote AGAINST fascists in the general

    That's how it should have worked, except that in the 2024 Democratic Presidential primary, when Biden was the only name on the ballot, we were STILL told to vote for him and only him or we'd be supporting Trump. In the primary! Voters in Michigan tried to campaign for "uncommitted" option in protest of the ongoing genocide in Gaza and how the administration was ignoring it, and they were crucified by establishment Democrats. Even Bernie Sanders distanced himself from the protest vote, saying to vote Biden no matter what. In the primaries!

  • Democrats hate progressives. The two would be separate parties in a sensible democracy, but in the legacy first-past-the-post American system, splitting the party while Republicans exist is political suicide. There are more progressives than center Democrats, but they are not as united as the core establishment Democrats are, which made any one of them irrelevant in primaries up to now. RCV has given them a real chance for the first time. For example by giving Lander votes to Mamdani in the instant runoff. The moment RCV got implemented, long-serving Democrats started suddenly getting kicked out in the primaries. This terrifies them, so Democrats will continue to fight against RCV in the future. Just look how both Cuomo and Adams will try to commit political murder-suicide now by running as independent in the general just so that the "official Democratic party nominee" would not win.

  • Wtf happened to Adams? Sure, he was under criminal corruption indictments, then cozied up to Trump and got "pardoned" (charges dismissed). But then he was supposed to be on the Democratic primary ballot, his picture was even in the official voter guide from a month ago, but on election day his name wasn't even in the list? Now he's apparently running as independent incumbent instead? What a booger!

    EDIT: Both Cuomo and Adams are intending to run as independent in the general? WhyTF do we even have primaries then! If they are not going to play by their own rules of their special little club, let's just extend Ranked Choice Voting to cover the general and scrap the primaries altogether!

  • Good question to ask! I had short hair then, which is why it worked. Have long hair now and could not get away with it again - start feeling too greasy after a week, and I like my hair silky with conditioner.

  • You implied it by answering Corngood's question "You have to rank 5 candidates?" with a link to a general RCV video. You misunderstood Corngood to not know what RCV is. However, within the context of this thread ("NYC elections"), some awareness of RCV is to be presumed. Indeed, Corngood mentions in another comment to have already used RCV before. To me it was clear Corngood was upset about the "have to rank 5", not about "WTF is RCV". By linking to a general video you are implying that this is how RCV works, that you HAVE to rank 5, otherwise it won't count, which is false. That's not what you meant, but this is how it appears to other readers who would not be aware of your original misunderstanding. Those of us who actually like RCV feel an obligation to step in and correct you, all of us at once, to pre-empt the hazard of somebody else believing in your (unintentional) implication and ending up with the wrong idea that "wow, RCV sucks! your ballot gets thrown out if you don't fill in all 5 bubbles perfectly!"