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164
Joined
2 yr. ago

  • Seems like a non-issue then? I know nothing about this guy, but if his office investigated and found nothing wrong with the gift (ie by him saying Trudeau hasn't listed it publicly, that means it came from a friend or relative), then there's nothing wrong? If someone wants to try and dig more into that and why they didn't approve it, go for it MPs, but this one doesn't seem like an actual issue.

  • Its a mess, for sure. This is a good first step, but in general children are wildly expensive, and the current model of raising children has increased the expectations for what is required of parents, while not actually changing (and in many cases reducing or removing) the resources they have at their disposal to do that.

    The only thing you can really do is wait out the first few years until the kids are in school, and hope one or both of you haven't fallen too far behind in experience to make up for it. It's one of the reasons multi-generational houses have, historically, been a thing. In the last 50-100 years we've entered an age where it's become normalized to live alone, but I think as pressures increase and little is done to improve them, these kinds of concessions will be ones people will have to be making more often. I'm not suggesting you do that - I know nothing about your situation. I'm agreeing that the life that many people had when they were children is not likely to be the life that many of their children will get to experience.

  • Interesting article. We have a daughter in central Ontario, and have been signing her up for daycare. The article is focused mostly on Alberta complaints, but here prices are still ~20-40$/day, which is allegedly half from their original costs (which terrifies me).

    Another way to look at it - $5k to $10k per year.

    I can't speak to the daycare side of things, but from our side, my spouse and I each make good money, and can make it work relatively easily. Anyone making less than us would likely not have a partner return to the workforce, especially if you have multiple children. At the old prices, even just back 5 years ago, a family of two or three would be looking at 40-50k a year in daycare costs, which very easily justifies a partner not working, especially if you can fold into that reduced car wear and tear, not rushing back to pick them up/drop them off, etc.

  • Fun fact, most countries still allow asbestos in a lot of products, including the States. Canada has an outright ban since 2018, which includes in concrete materials.

    It's a pain in the ass to deal with when we come across old asbestos concrete sewer pipes and have to dispose of them properly. It's weird that a lot of other countries are still producing it.

  • Huge pet peeve of mine when articles discuss a study but don't link it. Link

    When you look at what else we do in the modern world to avoid/mitigate a similar level of mortality, these seem like no brainers, especially the masking. A 0.19 per 100,000 reduction seems small, but the mortality rate was ~50 per 100,000 in Canada. This is basically a 4% reduction in deaths by masking. For a minor cost measure with no long term economic outcomes, this should have been an easy one for people to get on board with.

    School reduction in spread (~10%) shouldn't surprise anyone who knows school aged kids. They're germ balls, and multiple kids per household means there's effectively no "bubbles", so of course stopping that spread would have a huge impact, but then kids are stuck at home, so it has a huge cost too.

    SIPOs (Shelter in Place Order) had a 5% reduction in hospitalizations, which is honestly smaller than I was expecting.

    See below for the mortality summarization.

    Specific NPIs. Of the 6 NPIs studied in per capita mortality, bar/restaurant closures experienced the largest effects 4 weeks after implementation, corresponding to 1.08 fewer deaths per 100,000. Although we did not find any more evidence of fewer deaths per capita, limited gatherings (–6.41%), business (–5.32%) and school closures (–3.98%) were associated with decreased mortality growth rates after 2 weeks, whereas SIPOs (–1.66%), masks (–1.9%), and school closures (–8.29%) corresponded to reductions after 3 weeks. SIPOs were the only NPI studied at the ≥4-week lag for growth rates and were associated with a 1.95% drop in the mortality rates. Although the authors observed mitigative effects of travel restrictions on case growth rates, this was not the case for mortality.

    I imagine its a tricky thing to study in any detail, and its interesting to look back now to see the effectiveness of the measures put in place.

  • There's a reason we have all the checks and red tape that housing developments go through. Because once the developers leave, it's the Municipality that has to maintain their infrastructure.

    I can't count the number of times I've worked on a subdivision project built in the 60s, 70s, and 80s, only to find a half dozen other problwms that we need to fix, at the cost of the City/Town, because it wasnt done right the first time.

    Beyond that, those developments had no proper storm water treatment method, and now that we've successfully paved over half the swamps, we're realizing that untreated storm water wreaks havoc on streams and rivers and lakes. Now we've got to build to deal with that, another big cost.

    Like no shit stuff was easier to do back in the "good ol days". They just didn't bother figuring out the problems that we're having to deal with now.

  • Really? Every single item is wrapped in plastic at your grocery store? No loose apples, cucumbers, potatoes, or leafy greens?

    If those are all wrapped in plastic, then look for what options have less plastic. Avoid double wrapped items, for example, or anything marketed as single servings.

    I feel like none of this is that hard to come up with. It's unfortunate you don't seem interested in an actual conversation. Hope you have a better rest of your day.

  • You should blame them and still choose options with less plastic where possible? I don't see where this idea of black and white, one or the other comes from

    Where it's feasible given your financial and geographical means, avoid food wrapped in plastics, foods shipped from far away, and meats. Not every single item in the store comes in plastic. It will require adjusting your habits, for sure.

    No need to demonize anyone for not being able to if it doesn't work, but every time you choose something better, it's an incremental step forward.

    At the same time, send an email or phone call to the grocery store manager. Write to your local politician and push for laws regarding stricter use of plastics, more comprehensive recycling programs, or funding and grants for local farmers.

    Simply being angry online and not changing your own habits or lobbying for change isn't actually improving anything.

  • Not the person above, but Corporations are built around the idea of selling something. The biggest way to reduce your environmental impact is to not buy shit. Doesn't matter if the shit is eco friendly, more shit means more emissions.

    Corporations don't pollute for shits and giggles. They pollute because they want to make stuff for us to buy. Shell doesn't just make pollution, they pollute on the way to producing gas.

    If we cut back on how much gas we use, Shell pollutes less because they have less gas to sell.

    That doesn't absolve Shell of their role in chasing profits over environmental protection, and there's plenty of space for demanding better and holding them accountable, but acting like these corps pollute just cuz is disingenuous. They pollute because we want shit.

  • EVs make a difference for anyone in an area with low density. I live in the country relatively close to population centres, but it's impossible for me to ever imagine transit being even near me.

    We will literally always have a need for small, individual vehicles of some kind for most the population. If we could reduce that to one car, then supplement with transit, where available, or carpooling? Then also make that car an EV instead of ICE? That's a huge emissions reduction

  • Interesting article, and though long, well worth the read.

    It's unfortunate to see someone fall down into negativity like that. I imagine decades of warnings he was outlining as clearly as possible falling onto dead ears would jade someone, and perhaps he's got the view that it isn't his life that will be impacted? It would be easy to distance yourself that way from it, and might explain his recalcitrance

  • I've used the system pretty regularly. To be fair, I live in a small city (150,000) within the golden horseshoe, so definitely better care compared to many throughout rural areas.

    In the past few years I've had the birth of a child including all the various follow ups and shots, a stress test, blood work to rule out several heart issues, a halter monitor test, an ultrasound of my heart, three sets of baseline blood work, and four family doctor appointments.

    The biggest fee at each was parking.

    I don't disagree we have tons of room for improvement. Our contributions each year (ie personal amount of taxes we pay for healthcare in Ontario) have not been sufficient to keep up with the growing and aging population. We desperately need greater cancer screening and diagnostic services, as prevention and early detection can save billions in future chemo/rad or operations. Rural areas and family doctors need a rework, as many people are without one due to fewer and fewer docs entering that field.

    That said, I would never take the US system over Canadas. The enormous stress illness would place on a family doesn't seem worth it for the meager tax savings, and the low wait times seem to only be avoided in the US system by paying out of pocket, which is not feasible for many.

  • Pretty sure they bought the trademark from the company who owned it previous (for a 1980s era board game if I recall correctly). They bought it to prevent shitty 2077 clones with the same name from popping up. I haven't heard of them actively pursuing copyright infringement against others who use cyberpunk.

  • Not the person you were responding to, but this article definitely has some big problems, the largest of which is they don't cite any sources. None. That's a significant problem for a 'scientific' article.

    The first claim - Women hunted too - they present good evidence for, and a number of other studies have shown that many other societies had more integrated roles.

    The second claim - Women are better at endurance than men - is shaky.

    If you follow long-distance races, you might be thinking, wait—males are outperforming females in endurance events! But this is only sometimes the case. Females are more regularly dominating ultraendurance events such as the more than 260-mile Montane Spine foot race through England and Scotland, the 21-mile swim across the English Channel and the 4,300-mile Trans Am cycling race across the U.S.

    Looking back at the placements, I agree women are definitely doing well, but they're not what I'd call dominating. Women's 1st place is placing ~5-10th overall. Impressive, for sure, but not dominating. They again, provide no sources, years of the race, or names of these women.

    The inequity between male and female athletes is a result not of inherent biological differences between the sexes but of biases in how they are treated in sports.

    An enormous leap. This is a great theory to test and analyze, or link to others who have tested it, but not something to state as fact in a scientific article.

    As an example, some endurance-running events allow the use of professional runners called pacesetters to help competitors perform their best. Men are not permitted to act as pacesetters in many women's events because of the belief that they will make the women “artificially faster,” as though women were not actually doing the running themselves.

    Once again, I'm curious what races. I'm involved on the running scene, and have never heard of this rule before. Google results didn't show anything either. Once again, a distinct lack of sources.

    Women are definitely capable of doing super endurance events, but they are not the equivalent of men on setting records for any race I’ve found. See below for a few ultra endurance races I know of.

    One called “backyard ultra”. Basically you do a lap of 6.7km each hour until everyone else drops out. World records are all men by a long shot - https://backyardultra.com/world-rankings/

    Fastpacking, a slower event than the backyard ultras, involve hiking/jogging through hiking trails while carrying what you need. Definitely slower pace, and I’d argue closer to what I’d imagine with a long, days-long hunt would be like for ancient tribes. FKT, or fastest known times, are often found at this website. Looking at all the times, men carry a significant lead in both supported (ie someone else carries your food/water/sleeping gear), and unsupported. As an example, look at the Appalachian Trail – https://fastestknowntime.com/route/appalachian-trail

    Even the RAAM shows solo male records much faster than women: https://www.raamrace.org/records-awards

    The thing the article failed to mention (and the thing I think is key) is that women excel at doing these things, typically, with less energy burnt both during and after the races. This is hinted at, implied, and signalled, but never outright stated.

    Women on the whole are smaller, and tend to have better insulin responses (as mentioned in the article) which means their blood sugar stays consistent during exercise and after. Consistent blood sugar means less wasted energy. Larger heart and lungs, combined with higher type 2 muscle fibres compared to women’s type 1 (from the article) means, again, less wasted energy and more efficiencies. Less muscle damage, as mentioned in the article, means less to repair, which means more saved energy. In a hunter/gather society, this saved energy can be significant.

    With modern access to food, that evolutionary advantage seems to vanish, and the article doesn’t even touch on it.

  • Women are definitely capable of doing super endurance events, but they are not the equivalent of men on setting records for any race I've found.

    One called “backyard ultra”. Basically you do a lap of 6.7km each hour until everyone else drops out. World records are all men by a long shot - https://backyardultra.com/world-rankings/

    Fastpacking, a slower event than the backyard ultras, involve hiking/jogging through hiking trails while carrying what you need. Definitely slower pace, and I’d argue closer to what I’d imagine with a long, days-long hunt would be like for ancient tribes. FKT, or fastest known times, are often found at this website. Looking at all the times, men carry a significant lead in both supported (ie someone else carries your food/water/sleeping gear), and unsupported. As an example, look at the Appalachian Trail – https://fastestknowntime.com/route/appalachian-trail

    Even the RAAM shows solo male records much faster than women: https://www.raamrace.org/records-awards

    The thing the article failed to mention (and the thing I think is key) is that women excel at doing these things, typically, with less energy burnt both during and after the races. Women on the whole are smaller, and tend to have better insulin responses (as mentioned in the article) which means their blood sugar stays consistent during exercise and after. Consistent blood sugar means less wasted energy. Larger heart and lungs, combined with higher type 2 muscle fibres compared to women's type 1 means, again, less wasted energy and more efficiencies. Less muscle damage, as mentioned in the diagram, means less to repair, which means more saved energy. In a hunter/gather society, this saved energy can be significant.

    With modern access to food, that evolutionary advantage seems to vanish, and the article doesn't even touch on it.

  • Worth pointing out that there is lots of existing races that would compare "sustain exertion for longer".

    One called "backyard ultra". Basically you do a lap of 6.7km each hour until everyone else drops out. World records are all men by a long shot - https://backyardultra.com/world-rankings/

    Fastpacking, a slower event than the backyard ultras, involve hiking/jogging through hiking trails while carrying what you need. Definitely slower pace, and I'd argue closer to what I'd imagine with a long, days-long hunt would be like for ancient tribes. FKT, or fastest known times, are often found at this website. Looking at all the times, men carry a significant lead in both supported (ie someone else carries your food/water/sleeping gear), and unsupported. As an example, look at the Appalachian Trail -- https://fastestknowntime.com/route/appalachian-trail

    EDIT: The thing the article failed to mention (and the thing I think is key) is that women excel at doing these things, typically, with less energy burnt both during and after the races. Women on the whole are smaller, and tend to have better insulin responses (as mentioned in the article) which means their blood sugar stays consistent during exercise and after. Consistent blood sugar means less wasted energy. Larger heart and lungs, combined with higher type 2 muscle fibres compared to women’s type 1 means, again, less wasted energy and more efficiencies. Less muscle damage, as mentioned in the diagram, means less to repair, which means more saved energy. In a hunter/gather society, this saved energy can be significant.

    With modern access to food, that evolutionary advantage seems to vanish, and the article doesn’t even touch on it.