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Posts
8
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664
Joined
2 yr. ago

  • I believe you that cheap lumber has always been bad.

    The top and the bottom aren't going to change. They CAN'T change. It's physically and logically impossible for them to change.

    I live in BC where forestry is a big part of the economy. As i understands it, there is a big difference in log quality between old growth fiber and second growth fiber. It's because old growth trees grew in forests and second growth trees grew in fields (initially).

    Trees grow towards light. Forests are shady so trees grow slowly and pretty much straight up. Fields are bright so light is everywhere and trees grow quickly in every direction. Therefore old growth trees have fewer knots, and tighter, straighter grain where second growth has more knots, and fat rings with more twist.

    Also because of improved distribution infrastructure the cost of shipping crappy wood to a market where people don't know any better has gone down. Also if you live in an area with historically good wood supply, it's also easier for the good stuff to be sold into other markets too.

    Also, because everybody tried to build a new deck at the same time (during the pandemic) quality control may be more lax now because they know it will sell anyway.

    Here is a quick visual comparison between old growth and second growth forests. The video more from an ecological perspective but it gives a good view of the difference between an old growth forest and a replanted forest.

    There are a lot of differences between old growth and new growth wood that could at least partially account for your colleagues' opinion.

    Another thing that's potentially changed is who they're buying their wood from. Buying it from an orange hardware store vs from an actual building supplies store could make a big difference.

  • I'm with you.

    I agree that SM isn't serving Canadians, and that we should have a system that protects domestic dairy farmers and other 'staple' producers as an essential part of our national food security infrastructure. A well regulated market is the answer here.

    A bit of a nonsequiter but: Instead of trusting a precariously funded patchwork of volunteer organizations, we should have a national system for getting food to hungry Canadians. I think we should leverage the existing national food distribution oligopoly (Loblaw/Sobey) to accomplish this.

  • My kids are a similar age to one of the children that died, it's totally heartbreaking.

    To imagine ushering my children out into the bitter bitter cold to try to build them a better life.... so sad.

    We need to build a world where people are less desperate.

  • I don't support the execution of the Uvalde shooter.

    What does killing him accomplish?

    Justice? Not really.

    Restitution? Not at all.

    Vengeance? Not really.

    Deterrence? Not really.

    Closure for the families of the victims? I suppose.

    I don't know about this case, but some families of victims oppose the death penalty, even in the case of the murder of their children.

    Some reasons for this view could be religious beliefs, or the view that death is the easy way out, or the deterrence value of being able to point at a person in jail, or the potential for the person to do some good in the world.

    These people would object to closure for them being used as justification for killing their child's murderer.

    It's not fair to victim families to make them choose life or death for a murderer. It would be a decision they'd have to live with forever. We can't do that to them.

    My opinion is that capital punishment should only be used where a person guilty of a 'capital crime' can't be reliably imprisoned.

    Ie I'm not sure Iraqis were wrong to execute Saddam Hussein. I don't think it would be wrong for countries that struggle with corruption in their penal system to execute cartel leaders (that have been convicted of 'capital crimes'). War crimes, insurrection leaders, that sort of thing.

  • This is all conjecture:

    It serves Trump for his j6 insurrectionists and their families to believe he'll pardon them all. His supporters (j6 and other extremists) serve Trump by continually reassuring each other that the pardons will definitely happen day 1.

    Trump supporters are surely telling each other that they have it from 'reliable sources' (their imaginations) that Trump will pardon everyone that's faithful. The day of forgiveness is near and all they have to do is have faith and do good works (spread the faith, give money) and their redemption shall come.

  • Oxford Economics, a private, for profit, market research firm performed the research.

    Profit oriented research firms have an interest in generating headlines which drive institutions to pay for their complete analysis.

    Was their research undertaken under their own initiative or was the research commissioned? If commissioned, by whom? and what influence did the commissioning party have over the scope of the research, and the decision to release the brief?

    We need independent academia to mitigate the biases of for profit research.

    Just my two cents ($0.015 USD).

  • I'm not so sure. There are some people that oppose any sort of project happening in natural areas. Also there are probably legitimate concerns about pollution and contamination with this project, but idk.

    The way they sabotaged the project was by making it harder to cut down trees (ie more likely they'll damage the logging equipment).

    That's not what I would consider the M.O. of "oil and gas folks".

  • Yeah I'm also interested in reducing barriers to migration from a human rights perspective.

    But I think we need to reduce international disparities in standard of living before open borders would really work.

    I think trade penalties against countries with high degrees of wealth concentration and/or without living wage regulations etc might help. Idk.

  • As a Canadian I also sometimes envy the opportunities that exist in the USA but I absolutely would not want Canada to be a 51st (& 52nd?) state. (Not would I actually seek to move there)

    You do know that even though they have capitalism in Mexico, it doesn't trickle down to benefit any of the people there, right?

    Yes, this is an inherent challenge with capitalism (capital concentration).

    I just do not understand why every concept that might work always has to be questioned this way as if it was anymore ridiculous or intolerable than he current migrant situation at the border.

    I mean I think it's important to question ideas before implementing them, but you're right that your country (and mine) have some serious challenges to tackle with respect to migration. Mexico also struggles with migration across its southern (and coastal?) border(s).

    It looks like in 2013 about 60% of Mexicans favoured forming a single country with the USA (if doing so would improve their standard of living). That data is over 10 years old and a lot has changed since then but honestly it's higher than I would have thought.

  • 51st state? How about 51-65th state? Have you ever spoken to a Mexican that lives in Mexico?

    It's pretty clear the mexican population would rather be part of our country, and not separated by all these barriers.

    It's not at all clear that that's the case.

    And once, most of western America WAS part of Mexico.

    Maybe you should give those lands back to Mexico. Way fewer people would be changing countries than if Mexico joined the USA.

    allow our capitalism to help put money into the coffers of the people of mexico

    You know that they have capitalism in Mexico too right?

  • When I was a boy scout when of my troop leaders (and father of one of the other scouts) killed himself after gambling away his house, leaving his wife and kid(s?) homeless and penniless.

    I don't really know the details because I was a kid, I'm not traumatized by it or anything but it puts it into pretty stark relief for me.

    I know more people whose lives have been ruined by gambling than by drunk driving, drug use and STDs put together. It's about education and anti-normalization.

    Gambling houses abuse the risk/reward/ pleasure dynamics of the human brain. They should not be advertised or normalized at all.

  • I guess I get what you're saying. You're saying that it's irrelevant what the requester/demander calls it, what makes the distinction is whether or not there are stated consequences beyond the displeasure of the requester/demander.

  • Don't buy a battery only car if you don't have a place to charge it. But that's totally irrelevant to school busses.

    They wouldn't use public chargers you buffoon.

    School busses are used like 4 hours per day, so that leaves 20 hours per day for charging.

    99% of School busses need to drive less than 156 miles per day.

    School busses drive slowly, another thing well suited to electrification.

    Honestly lithium batteries are probably totally unneeded here. Something swappable? A cheaper lower performance battery could be used and charged or swapped during the 6 hours the kids are at school. Charging speed could be actively managed to help level grid load e.g charge overnight, but not during peak usage times.