ICE engines eat themselves in many more different kinds of weird ways: timing chains and belts, coolant leaks, any number of problems with valves and actuators. They're extraordinarily complex devices and it's a testament to engineering genius (and persistence) that we've made them this reliable. But they fail much more often than batteries or motors. They have many more moving parts. It's just the devil we know.
I've got two EVs. Basically zero problems. I've known one or two people who have had issues, but never with the drive train. Always something dumb like the "infotainment system" or (for a Tesla owning friend) stupid buzzing and vibration they couldn't make go away and stupid problems with door handles.
The Tesla weirdness is part of why I went with Nissans. They're 100% normal cars except for the electric drive train. All the other parts can be purchased at AutoZone and everything else can be worked on by a normal mechanic.
There's some mechanics in my area that have been learning how to do stuff with EVs like aftermarket battery upgrades on older models, but it's a bit expensive. Mine are 5 and 13 years old respectively and both batteries are fine. The 5yo one is the same as the day it was bought. The latter's lost some capacity but still very usable as a city car.
We picked up a used 2022 Leaf S+ a while back and it's been amazing.
Also just about the only shade tree mechanic EV. Even swapping a battery is doable by the typical car guy. Rebuilding one isn't much harder due to no cooling.
What's special about fossil fuel? Is a kilowatt-hour from burning carbon magically able to power an economy better than one from a solar panel, a wind turbine, or a nuclear reactor?
I think you could make that argument (at least structurally) as late as the 2000s when batteries and solar were still un-economical. Today it's very possible to power a modern economy without fossil fuels in almost every sector except long haul trucking, a few industrial processes, and aviation, and those together are a small percentage of overall fossil fuel use. Aviation and trucking are less than 10% of oil use.
Europe doesn't have an energy shortage that's not self-inflicted. Becoming dependent on Russian gas combined with anti-nuclear in Germany probably contribute. German greens are basically an advertising arm of Gazprom. (Just like how America's huge inflation is self-inflicted via dumb tariffs and unnecessary wars. We should pay politicians an extra bonus to do nothing.)
The most likely explanation for Europe's stagnation is a mix of stifling bureaucracy, low birth rates, brain drain (mostly to the US), and policies that are explicitly growth-limiting.
All that is historically true, but most new energy being added to the grid is now renewable. Solar and batteries continue to get cheaper and it's already the cheapest source of new power in sunny places.
I have seen this raised as yet another interesting Fermi paradox idea: maybe our planet is unusual in that it stored up a giant store of easily exploitable energy to bootstrap a technological civilization.
It's impossible to run out of fossil fuels. There are always more places to look. But the cost of extraction may continue to rise if there's not another technical breakthrough on the scale of fracking or horizontal drilling.
It's cheaper than nuclear. If one is discussing vs. renewables, then Europe is comparatively poorly situated to exploit those, especially solar.
I think Europe's larger problem is a smothering blanket of taxation and regulation. Good for standard of living in the short term (or at least was), but not good for growth and long term competitiveness.
No, but that's beside the point I was making. Europe can't compete with places that aren't imposing Pigouvian taxes or the equivalent. Even if those are added, in a renewable (which will be mostly solar) powered world Europe will be at a disadvantage relative to places closer to the equator.
I’m willing to bet that figuring out how to survive cryostasis is easier than building any kind of starship. We can already do it with some organs and many tissues.
Do that first. It has huge medical benefits too, so it’s dual use not just for space flight.
If I search for The Best of Both Worlds but open the video to find it's csam and not st:tng then I've unwittingly started watching, and thus potentially seeding, the csam.
But even simple checks like the number of seeders on a torrent will defeat a vast majority of this problem. I would not expect a torrent with 1k seeders to be csam for e.g.
I understand the worry, and it is a difficult problem worth thought but the alarmist virtue signalling helps absolutely no one, victims included.
That might work for popular culture. It's probably a good strategy if you want to watch the latest superhero movie.
I listen to the Butthole Surfers and Amboog-a-Lard - I'm willing to bet a good portion of their material has less seeders than much illegal content do.
Are you not describing perfect as the enemy of good?
A product doesn't need to serve EVERY human on earths needs, just enough of them that it can become large enough that established legacy solutions need to adapt.
I get why you might think this wouldn't be a fit for YOU but rather than argue against it from a niche viewpoint instead maybe look at how if it did exist it could be good for many.
> If the system is truly distributed it means you might not be able to participate without hosting or transmitting CSAM.
Depends on the P2P architecture. With something like bittorrent / webtorrent you will be distributing CSAM only if you download it yourself first. Otherwise there is no way for any CSAM content to appear on your device. The fear that an algorithm may spread CSAM on the network by making you view one accidentally is a legitimate concern though.
I did tons of electronic learning as far back as the 80s and 90s, and still do.
It’s algorithmic social media. There’s loads of both direct causal and indirect evidence that algorithmic attention hacking has made everything worse: mental health, learning, socialization, motivation, productivity.
Short form content makes it even worse. It’s an endless barrage of short pointless tidbits with no connection, no plot, no larger theme, and often little to no content in the actual shorts. It makes trash TV look like high art from a lost golden age.
I don't know why this is even a tiny bit controversial. The idea that the media you consume in formative years has a huge effect on mental development seems extremely obvious.
I grew up in the 90s. Its not like all our media was Tolstoy. But for my cohort it was very normal to read young adult literature - which meant books with 100s of pages, or video games that were elaborate, challenging, and demanded imagination and focus. The shortest media we consumed was 30 minute sitcoms. We got aesthetics, narrative structure, problem solving, focus - and maybe even some semblance of values.
Today, and I can hardly believe it, it really seems to be the case that the average teenager has read zero books cover to cover, or even fully watched a movie as difficult as ET. What she has done, is consumed hundreds of hours of twitchy bizarre quasi-algorithmic video content through a blaring handheld terminal thats held more intimately than any friend or pet. Far from being content made with artistic integrity or true dedication to the fostering of the young, this stuff is more akin to direct neural stimulation.
What I don't understand, is why anyone would think that such a shift would result in anything other than marked mental deterioration.
Even this week following new mediocre PISA results for Danish pupils, I see organizations like the Danish Industry Association and the Danish Chamber of Commerce posting calls for more computers in classrooms, to combat the problems caused by computers in classrooms. They say kids just need to be tought better “technology understanding”.
That would be 100% the fault of the people who set them loose on such things, and such things should not be on the open Internet for tons of reasons. This just adds a new reason that pathetic security around SCADA systems is dangerous. It was already dangerous before.
If I release a wild monkey in your rare antiques shop, it’s my fault as the responsible party for the monkey.
ICE engines eat themselves in many more different kinds of weird ways: timing chains and belts, coolant leaks, any number of problems with valves and actuators. They're extraordinarily complex devices and it's a testament to engineering genius (and persistence) that we've made them this reliable. But they fail much more often than batteries or motors. They have many more moving parts. It's just the devil we know.
I've got two EVs. Basically zero problems. I've known one or two people who have had issues, but never with the drive train. Always something dumb like the "infotainment system" or (for a Tesla owning friend) stupid buzzing and vibration they couldn't make go away and stupid problems with door handles.
The Tesla weirdness is part of why I went with Nissans. They're 100% normal cars except for the electric drive train. All the other parts can be purchased at AutoZone and everything else can be worked on by a normal mechanic.
There's some mechanics in my area that have been learning how to do stuff with EVs like aftermarket battery upgrades on older models, but it's a bit expensive. Mine are 5 and 13 years old respectively and both batteries are fine. The 5yo one is the same as the day it was bought. The latter's lost some capacity but still very usable as a city car.
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