RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
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User ID: 317
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
11mo ago
Reminds me of the Mussolini quote 'War is to man what maternity is to a woman'.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
He almost certainly is - he blocked me after I made other anti-Israel lobby posts in the past. Such is life. We all bring our personal interests to the table, wherever we go.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
Citation needed.
China is the sixth biggest oil producer on the planet. Four million barrels per day. Plus they're friendly with Russia.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
Indeed, China's been working land routes for energy, self-sufficiency and so on. It really depends how much energy they need. I imagine a lot of their industry would be shut down if they're at war with the US and allies, so there are savings there. 65% of their energy is used in industry. Whether many of those workers could switch to war work is another question, I doubt China could find ways to employ them all or resources to produce with them.
Between domestic production and Russia, they have enough oil for war use. It's an interesting question as to how much oil is needed for civilian uses in wartime though, or what level of mobilization they choose.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
If the great power and destructive energy of 2% of the population is on par with 60% of the population (or 98% of the population if we interpret gentiles literally) then something is seriously wrong.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
That link doesn't have meaning. They're just inventing nonsense based upon assumptions of ideas that don't exist. It has no relation to the real world, no potential uses and no falsification. This is just make-work for philosophers.
Would a brain made up of Chinese people acting as molecules have emotions? Providing they mapped out all the hormones and so on, of course. Emotions are real things that can be observed. They then take a step further into the feeling of emotions, as though that's separate from emotions themselves. That sense of the word 'experience' from their philosophical zombie idea doesn't work, it's not a real thing.
Would that woman who's read about red but not seen it truly understand what red is? They assume there is an 'experience' of seeing red inherent in the question. She simply hasn't seen red, she's read a lot of documents and knows a lot about red. There's no confusion here other than what confusion the philosophers bring with them.
"by their nature ruthless actors that will stop and nothing to advocate their own interests"
Yes, but interests are based on one's analysis of threat. If the Russians think 'oh the West hate us and if they beat China we're fucked' then they'll join up with China. They certainly do now and have joined up. Whereas, if the Russians thought that we weren't interested in undermining them they'd be more cautious about supporting China. Maybe they'd just try to play both sides off against eachother for their own profit.
I maintain we have a genuine, significant-issue conflict with China about control of the world economy, about dominance of Asia and so on. We should focus on the significant issues first, prioritizing the central front over these small peripheral issues. Back in 1935, the British and French were allies with Mussolini under the Stresa Front, where he guaranteed Austria against Germany. But then Mussolini invaded Ethiopia and the British and French imposed sanctions on Italy in response. Naturally Italy joined up with Germany and enabled the Anschluss. For the sake of Ethiopia, the British and French threw away a well-placed ally and made WW2 into a serious proposition as opposed to a 'home-by-Christmas' conflict. This was an idiotic decision and we should not replicate it.
but you, America, you have been a naughty boy and must get on your knees and welcome the whip to atone for your sins.
I'd prefer 'reaping what one sows'. We (the West) have blown up Libya, Iraq, made a good effort at blowing up Syria. Amongst other things, we've gotten engaged well into Eastern Europe where the risks outweigh the gains. At no point has anyone put serious thought into the consequences of our actions, how the other major powers are responding. When we blew up Iraq, we also torpedoed any hope of North Korea refraining from nuclearization. They, quite reasonably, did not want to be next on the chopping block! Decisionmakers just ignored Burns in 2008 when he said that moving to bring Ukraine into NATO would make anyone remotely near the Kremlin very angry and threatened. Then they act surprised when Russia throws a tantrum and starts interfering with our operations! We cannot ignore the consequences of our actions forever.
Furthermore, what I'm saying is not in conflict with offensive realism. Offensive realism has a central tenet in that state actions are based upon the fear of other states, amongst other things. Perceptions are vital. It is a complex idea that can be interpreted in many ways dependent upon context - furthermore its founder Mearsheimer and I am in agreement on this issue. The benefit of integrating Ukraine into NATO or the Western bloc is not worth the cost of having Russia as a locked-in enemy. We should not flanderize offensive realism as 'attack and advance anywhere', just as even an offensive minded commander would balk at frontal attacks across rivers into well-fortified enemy lines.
See Mearsheimer's quotes:
Great powers are especially vigilant about their security, and when they feel threatened, they invariably take measures to protect themselves. This wariness explains why Russian leaders have stubbornly opposed NATO enlargement since the mid-1990s and why most American realists opposed it as well. Liberals, however, tend to dismiss balance-of-power logic as irrelevant in the twenty-first century. This kind of thinking helps to make liberals less restrained than realists about using military force.
So, what I am saying to you is that even if we are able to turn around Western policy and convince Putin that the West has good intentions, the future of NATO is uncertain, which means a lot of trouble ahead. For all these reasons, I'm quite sure you cannot go back to the status quo ante in Eastern Europe. My bottom line is that we had an excellent situation with regard to European security before [floating the idea of Georgian and Ukrainian NATO membership in] 2008. And we, meaning the West, blew it big time.
To argue that Russia’s reaction to NATO expansion was based on “resentment” … is to trivialize the country’s motives. Fear is at the root of Russia’s opposition to the prospect of Ukraine becoming a Western bastion on its border. Great powers always worry about the balance of power in their neighborhoods and push back when other great powers march up to their doorsteps.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
Don't you know people with healthy diets? I have relatives who eat muesli and yoghurt in the morning, a salad with some prosciutto berries for lunch, some potato chips (that is to say fairly traditional ones with just potato and salt) and cheese in front of the television, then beef, rice and vegetables for dinner. Or maybe salmon or lamb instead of beef.
They're not fat and never have been. It's not dieting so much as having a healthy diet. If we started people on that sort of diet rather than American style plastic food, there'd be no problem. These people have no attraction to McDonalds or whatever, they look upon it with disgust.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
At no point did I say Rowling was anti-Semitic, only that her work can be interpreted to be anti-Semitic.
They filmed it at the Australia House in London.
Correct, I slipped up there.
It's a star from the Australian flag.
It's clearly a hexagram, two equilateral triangles, which is also a star of David. The early Australian flag had a hexagram on it as well but this was changed in a couple of years to a seven pointed star. At any rate, there is nothing distinctively Australian about hexagrams, it does not symbolize Australia.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
Adjust it for the cost of living
It's already in PPP terms, cost of living is adjusted for.
Russian "aid" enriched Ukrainian oligarchs, barely anything of it dripped down to the general population, and reliance on Russian gas made investment in domestic production unprofitable.
During the early 2000s, Ukraine was using its large Soviet-era metallurgical industry, powered by cheap Russian gas, to export steel and grow fairly quickly. Workers do work in steel mills, there are benefits for the stability of the currency. That Ukrainian oligarchs were enriched during this process does not mean Russia/Soviets was evil for providing all these steel mills and cheap energy to run them.
People talking about Russia relieving Soviet debt apparently forget the fact that Russia got most of Soviet assets, but also a lot of countries had debts before Soviet Union — now they had to repay Russia.
That doesn't make any sense. What are you talking about, tsarist-era debt? Was Ukraine accruing much debt during its brief existence post-WW1? If Russia gets 75% of Soviet assets and Ukraine 15% but Russia pays all of Ukraine's share of Soviet debt, it follows that Ukraine comes out ahead.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
According to World Population Review, Russia's median income is $5500 to Ukraine's $4400, which is a fairly substantial difference.
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/median-income-by-country
Consider also that if it weren't for Russian aid and debt relief, Ukraine's situation pre-2014 would've been much worse. Cheap energy is good - nobody is saying that the fad of refusing to buy Russian gas imports is a great opportunity for Germany since they'll be able to 'reform their economy'.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
China giving up the measures really doesn't come off to me as anything beyond the final nail in the Zero-Covid coffin - to those willing to use an openly, nakedly authoritarian country as an example, China was really the last attempt to prove that Zero-Covid is even possible to maintain for an indefinite amount of time (because, really, at this point, what would be the alternate?
Looks more like they played cooperate in a prisoners dilemma. We know what the Nash Equilibrium is.
Cooperate - lock down hard so the virus can't spread or evolve
Defect - semi-random theatrics and half-hearted lockdowns that minimize death toll and economic burden
If you cooperate while everyone else defects, you pay all the burden while everyone else evolves new variants and transmits it back to you.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
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You don't need 1000 tanks to defend against minor incursions, only full-scale wars and nobody launches 'minor incursions' against nuclear powers - if they do they are quickly squelched by both sides
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Nukes are not hard to obtain for technically advanced countries like Poland
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Only 100-200 warheads are needed, an arsenal on the scale of Britain and France. Even ICBMs are unnecessary since Poland is close to Russia. They only need mobile launchers, which is somewhat complicated.
Supposedly the Poles plan to field 300,000 troops, an increase on their current 150,000. That's a lot of troops.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
How does the US look if you break the statistics out by race? My suspicion is there a minority population with a disproportionate contribution.
Of course there is, I considered including Detroit as a small Jamaica, the murder rate is about the same. I just wanted to be concise.
Is it the extra-judicial nature of the killing that feel warrents a poor grade? Many of the precursors to current western governments executed far more people than today.
Absolutely, extra-judicial killing is the problem. Perhaps I should've been more specific in my last paragraph. If I included executions, I'd probably have to include war as well. Anyway, executions are for a different purpose. Chemotherapy kills healthy cells like diseases do but its purpose is to improve the health of the body, not reduce it.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
How do you conceal that many 'disappearances' then?
Just the other day we're hearing about a few hundred people protesting over the strict COVID measures in China. You're implying that these measures never worked at any point if China experienced US-level death tolls. So why did they stick with them? And how are the Chinese concealing 10 million dead from their families, friends, satellites and economic indicators?
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
There are people who also argue that it will happen "never".
Well they're not serious thinkers, are they? Where is the law of physics that says it's impossible to make a rogue AI? Even if such a law did exist, never is a very strong word. I'd be cautious before saying we would 'never' find some way around thermodynamics, the most solid foundation we have. Who knows what could be achieved 500,000 years after the Scientific Revolution? We're only 300 or so years in, there may be a few revolutions to come.
It's outrageously silly to say 'never' when we have so many questions still unanswered, when AI is advancing at such a rapid pace.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
Rewarding people for negative action is rarely a good idea, it creates all kinds of distortions. It's the difference between rewarding/punishing and paying tribute.
You'd simply not get credit points for having bad children, or perhaps have them taken away if they're of the kind that has multiple arrests under the age of 18.
It's interesting to think how that would play out.
What happens if the Chinese say 'turn back' to the civilian vessel the US is escorting and then board the civilian ship? They've got a huge maritime militia for those things. Do you have US troops on the ship, locked in the wheelhouse, guarding the engine bay? Fistfights or improvised melee duels like the Indians and Chinese have in the Himalayas?
Or what if they just hit the freighter with an anti-ship missile and sink it?
And how are freighters offloading in ports that are being bombed? That's a pretty big, stationary target and China has plenty of missiles.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
A simple answer to that would be to add a feature where if you put in a certain code on login, you could make it appear from your end that you'd voted differently on certain questions. One username, two or more passwords. You'd have a preset for thugs coming in and saying 'This is MAGA country' and holding you at gunpoint until you revealed whether you voted for a border wall, not that this is a terribly likely scenario IMO.
Why don't you have a problem with the existing system? You could just get lots of mail-in ballots, fill them out yourself, allege that they're from legitimate voters and deliver them. There are many more ways of defrauding the paper system. Voter suppression, everything that each side complains about.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
What does 'blocking naval vessels entering international waters' mean? Is it ramming/harassment like the Chinese do but amped up? Just stealing cargo ships on the high seas like the US does to North Korea and Iran or Iran does in the straits of Hormuz? Are we talking about shooting at the Russian navy? That would be a simple, direct way to start a war. They have antiship missiles to shoot back with.
In my mind intervening conventionally means waging war against Russia. The 'at least' implies its a significant intervention if not a nuclear war.
I really think people in this thread are suggesting really unclear, impractical, provocative strategies as though they're easy, straightforward things to achieve. Attacking satellites could mean everything from shining lasers to temporarily blind sensors (which apparently the Russians and Chinese do daily) to nuking LEO. What does it mean to cut off Russian access to the sea? Does that mean sinking patrolling ballistic missile submarines or hemming them into port, threatening an integral part of their second-strike capacity?
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
Has the US promised to defend Ukraine under its nuclear umbrella? No. It's as simple as that.
You don't fight nuclear wars to defend countries if you don't even promise to do so beforehand.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1yr ago
Yeah, it's bizarre. I don't think these guys are the best and brightest.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
23m ago
Women are looking for a good-looking, confident but humble, respectful and unconditionally loving confidant who earns more than them...
Men are looking for a harem of sweet, nubile girls who'll provide stress-free sex on tap. Or perhaps a nice, pretty, forever-loyal tradwife who'll stay at home and raise children.
Nobody is going to get what they want unless they're very lucky or high-value. There are trade-offs. The tradwife probably isn't going to be that good looking. The harem girls are probably most interested in your wealth. The good-looking men are hard to lock down. The 'nice guys' aren't so attractive, physically or socially.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
1mo ago
If there were highly advanced and malevolent civilizations lurking out there, barring truly out there technologies and an implausible ability to cover their tracks in terms of emissions and signatures from before they knew how to start hiding or even the ability to do so, then there is simply no sense in trying to hide.
There are seriously powerful civilizations in that universe, powers that could snap the Xeelee like a twig. At one point they suggest that the fundamentals of mathematics were weaponized. I think most of the big players were never even biological, they were born when the universe was young, in higher dimensions.
If they RKV you, so fucking what,
The primary danger doesn't come from relativistic kill vehicles, it comes from one of the higher powers saying 'hey, these guys are behaving a little oddly and might become a future threat, let's stomp them to paste. We're not going to use sunbusting RKVs, we're going to utterly flatten them.' You don't want to draw attention to yourself. Fire off too many RKVs and you might draw the ire of the bigger fish. Outposts past the Oort won't save you from them.
Well, we don't really know how life came into existence either. It happened over 3 billion years ago! We can't know what the conditions were back then that resulted in life, so how can we rule it to be statistically impossible? The math is just made-up numbers.
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