cjet79
Anarcho Capitalist on moral grounds
Libertarian Minarchist on economic grounds
User ID: 124
cjet79
10mo ago
Congrats!
Father of two with a third on the way for me.
The advice in this thread is great. I read through a bunch to try and make sure I wasn't giving duplicate advice.
I'd add that your little one is going to come out with their own personality on day one. This is way more obvious when you've had a second kid.
My first child, very sweet and easy going, she came out and barely cried enough to let the doctors know her lungs worked. My second child came out screaming like a pterodactyl and had me and the nurses kinda reeling back like whoa. The second one has had a much more forceful and loud personality.
Some of the ease or difficulty of parenting will be related to their personality, so don't let the first child either give you a big head if it's too easy, or discourage you if it's too hard. Its going to be a bit of the luck of the draw.
cjet79
10mo ago
This is the kind of question I've been turning to AIs for lately. With all those cooking and recipe websites out there they must of had a lot of training data.
These were chatGPT's suggestions (condensed):
- Smoked Paprika
- Fennel Seeds
- Star Anise
- Lemon Zest
- Cumin and Coriander
- Balsamic Vinegar Reduction
- Cinnamon and Clove
- Chili Flakes and Cocoa
- Fresh Herbs (Basil, Thyme, Rosemary, Mint, Tarragon)
I'm not a huge fan of tomatoes, but I've always found acids to change their flavor in a way that lets me enjoy them more. So if the people around you are getting sick of tomatoes, maybe something with lemon juice or balsamic vinegar.
cjet79
10mo ago
First practice of the season for the college team. It was an off campus practice and we had to share the practice with the local team. But we had three recruits show up, which is not too bad for a first night. We went out to get burgers afterwards and I bought dinner for the new players. I heard them saying they had a lot fun to each other when I was out of the conversation but not fully out of earshot.
I'm trying to reshift the priorities of the club away from travel tournaments and entirely into recruiting. We are in a precarious situation where everyone is a senior and the club is on track to dissolve next year without someone to take up the mantle. If it comes down to it I will bribe some college freshmen to do it.
cjet79
10mo ago
Climatologists are mostly unwilling to consider these proposals. So all the official papers written by government orgs, NGOs, or University groups don't even consider this proposal. Even if many of them are aware of it, and they are definitely aware. People have known about this option for a few decades.
Its sometimes hard to know when a particular academic subject has gone over the edge from being disinterested scientists to mind-captured ideologues. (its certainly obvious when they are way over the line like in sociology, but I mean the crossover is hard to spot). I think this is maybe the clearest sign that climatology has gone over that edge.
Honestly, geoengineering proposals are awesome. And even a scientist with 1% mad scientist personality would want to study it. Luckily the public won't remain ignorant forever, and they'll just route around the climatologists: https://time.com/6314541/overshoot-commission-calls-for-climate-geoengineering-research/
cjet79
10mo ago
It is an ambiguous terms, but ignoring the concept might be more of a loss in understanding.
I think if there is anything that should be meant by state capacity it should mean the ability to wage war. Specifically to get shit done that allows for the waging of war. That would include industrial mobilization, but it would also include a competent and efficient bureaucracy, and a willingness and ability to use force to achieve ends
War is the one thing governments do that most other organizations don't do. And it was historically how you replaced badly functioning governments, so it was the only thing where the government had some incentive to do it well
America is in a unique situation that no one can really challenge them on the same footing in a war. They've had constant foreign adventures and occupations since world war 2. And if you didn't watch the news you could probably have gotten away without noticing any of them.
So there is no way to fully test the US's state capacity, and it likely doesn't matter too much if no one is around to defeat us. At least not yet.
cjet79
10mo ago
Isn’t there an obvious explanation?
I thought that they obviously made a mistake: the immigrants were supposed to be distributed, but all of the immigrants assigned to the few dozen different Springfield's throughout the US somehow all got sent to the same one.
cjet79
10mo ago
You mostly seem to come here and just offer hot takes. And "we should engage in violence" is too hot of a take. Antagonistic and culture warring. Ten day ban for now.
cjet79
10mo ago
She's been before. She went for another kids birthday, that's how she got the idea.
cjet79
10mo ago
There has got to be something wrong with that study. Some form of survivorship bias could definitely account for it. Lets say a hospital sees half of trampoline injuries from net-less trampolines, and half from net-having trampolines. Well the relevant information is: what portion of the population has nets for their trampoline? Unless its a 50-50 split, then the hospital data is actually skewed.
- Ensuring that a backyard trampoline has a net — that alone can cut the fracture rate in half.
- Allowing only one child on the trampoline at a time. A significant mismatch in size and weight, such as a teen and a toddler, is especially dangerous.
- Teaching kids not to jump onto the trampoline from roofs and other high places, which can lead to especially serious injuries.
My daughter is turning 6 and she wants her birthday at a Trampoline park. I'm dreading it, because I don't want to host the party where a kid gets seriously injured. And the party feels somewhat out of character for her. Since her other preferences are for butterflies and princess themes at the party. Or maybe its in character for her since butterflies fly, and she recently watched the Gymnastics Olympics where the women wore "princess" outfits.
Falling off is basically only part of the danger. The other danger is just that you can get a lot of height on trampolines, and that height can all come down in the wrong place or the wrong angle. Sometimes the wrong place is "on another person" sometimes it is off the trampoline. The wrong angle can break or sprain ankles, wrists, etc.
Either way, its maybe a good intermediate step for you to go to a trampoline park, watch your kid closely, and see how fine you feel with their safety in an environment that is monitored and modified for maximum safety. If you are uncomfortable with their behavior there then it will be even worse with an at home trampoline.
cjet79
10mo ago
I mean she seems better than Joe Biden as a candidate, but it's hard to be excited about nothing for a long time.
Once the excitement of her not being Joe Biden wears off, there isn't much she has been saying or doing to get people excited or interested.
cjet79
10mo ago
Sarcasm?
From memory:
- Guardian (defense)
- Engineer (building)
- Ranger (scout short range)
- Sniper (scout long range)
- Medic
- Demolition (explosives)
Ive played all but the engineer and ranger. Different game modes fit best for each one. Medic is what I play if no one else has jumped into the match yet, or if there are less than three medics already.
cjet79
10mo ago
I think two new game modes since you last played. A horde mode, and a hive extermination. I don't think I like either of those very much. I've drifted towards liking advance and secure. Because it is time limited and slightly less insane than the other game modes.
There is supposed to be a single player campaign in a month or so when the game releases.
The progression system has been changed up, 6 classes instead of 3.
Weapon progression is a thing.
I'm still trying to figure out which class I like best.
cjet79
10mo ago
Vidya thread
Im back to playing Starship Troopers. Still thoroughly enjoy the game. Only downside is low player counts. One of the recent additions that has made a dramatic atmospheric improvance is that corpses do not automatically despawn. And corpses can be climbed over. So you end up with situations like in the movies when stacks of bugs outside of the walls form a smooth ramp up to your poor troopers. Flamethrowers are more important for cleanup now.
cjet79
10mo ago
I have a neighbor I like that is running for city council, so I feel obligated to go vote. Usually I prefer to stay home. There is a weird civic pride and happiness at polling places that I stridently hate. Old people handing out "I voted" stickers. Kids waving flags and handing out pamphlets. People smiling. Ugh.
I'm usually not a party pooper in my day to day life. But I'm libertarian, so when it comes to politics I absolutely am a party pooper.
Every time I go to the polls I am reminded that I strongly want a "none of the above" option, or more accurately "I hate all of these people". Something that just consistently says I disapprove of this circus. I don't care too much what they do in case a "none of the above" wins. Endless re-elections, a term with no one taking the position, etc. As it is I mostly just vote libertarian ticket if there is one available, since that feels like the closest option to me saying "none of the above".
I don't want to have to care about these elections. In some sense they kind of matter. They give a sort of mandate that pushes things one direction for a few years. In other important senses they don't matter, bother major parties seem equally capable of implementing policies that fuck my life up with me barely being aware that they've done it. Latest example is a Trump era tax cut and a change to how software development is amortized that has basically tanked the software dev job market and left me stuck at a job that is boring.
My hope is for deadlocked and unproductive government.
cjet79
10mo ago
This is one of those things where my real life observations don't match up with what everyone is saying online.
My wife is pregnant with our third kid. I live in a single family home neighborhood but the bus stop right outside my house has about three dozen kids spread over 5 busses. (For some reason the neighborhood is split between two school districts for elementary and middle school).
Over the five years I've been in the neighborhood I've made friends with many other parents that have young children. Most of them just two kids. But quite a few with more than two, including two families with five kids.
My older brother has three kids. My younger sister only has one, but that kid is less than a year old and she has spoken about having three.
I had Bryan Caplan as a professor in college when he was collecting information and anecdotes for his "have more kids" book. I met his kids when they were young, because Caplan was willing to invite people to his house for a big Caplacon board gaming event.
My wife's cousin's are all having kids, the ones that aren't are having trouble conceiving, not choosing to abstain. My cousin's are mostly not old enough to be married, but the few that are only one of the three married ones is choosing to not have kids.
Most of my older coworkers have kids. Most of my wife's older coworkers ha e kids.
Basically my life is filled with being around families with kids.
I know its possible to be in a social bubble, but in so many other ways I straddle social bubbles. Of all the people I've described their living situation ranges from dense urban to no one within miles rural. Their political views are all over the map, all types of conservatives, liberals, and libertarians.
It takes me a while to come upon the problem. Its a problem of margins. Each family with kids is slightly smaller than they used to be. And there are slightly more people not having kids. And it's fully possible that most of these changes are happening with people outside of my large social bubble.
So I have no real intuition on why fertility rates are a problem. My wife and I like having kids. I find them generally less restrictive on my social life than a pet. In fact most of my social life is because I have kids. I meet new dads at the park and the pool where my kids play. There is a wine tasting I'm going to tomorrow with a bunch of neighborhood parents at the neighborhood pool.
Yah childbirth is objectively not a fun time. My wife is a geriatric pregnancy and the first trimester has been filled with her not feeling good. Mostly she jokes with other moms about how they seemingly totally forget the annoying parts of child birth. She has maintained a career through it all, and has more of an active job than I do.
I think there is a general neuroticism in the population that makes them worry too much about things. A lot of people kind of freak out about parenthood. My inside take is that it's not that hard and not that big of a deal. If you are placed into a situation you tend to figure things out. But if you spend all your time freaking out about the thing and avoiding it then yah you'll prove yourself right and not be able to do it.
cjet79
10mo ago
Would be funny if that was made explicit in the law:
"Any Chinese National spying for China in a foreign country may have their citizenship status revoked temporarily as a cover. But if they make it back to China safely we will reinstate their citizenship."
cjet79
10mo ago
The End of Homeless encampments?
My consumption of mainstream or traditional news is always a little slow and awkward. I mostly just read headlines, and I barely trust the headlines half the time. Local news is at least often verifiable by me directly or directly by someone I know in person.
One of the items I have been seeing more of is "homeless encampment in [local park / forest] cleared by city". I mostly just read these with a tentative mental "yay?" and moved on. Well once of those news headlines referred to a homeless encampment that is just down the street from where I live, so I've gotten more curious about what is actually going on with these stories.
I have a couple theories but I'm not sure where the truth lies:
- Cynical take: These stories are like "drug busts" a sort of photo opportunity for politicians. The policy does have real consequences, but mostly its an unsolvable problem so they like to just loudly "do something" about it on occasion near elections.
- Supreme court ruling: The supreme court recently had a ruling about homelessness and the ability of cities to criminalize 'camping'. So perhaps the legal landscape shifted at the city level, and their hands were no longer tied when trying to address this.
- Voter preference shift: The preferences of voters on this issue shifted enough that the former general sentiment was "be nice to people that are down on their luck" and has now become something like "eww, get these drug addicts out of my sight"
cjet79
10mo ago
There is also the funny phenomenon that plenty of academics don't have to interact with each other at all, so they can all independently look down down on all other fields and hold their own up as superior.
cjet79
10mo ago
Their writing is better than most here, according to them:
https://www.themotte.org/post/1087/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/234268?context=8#context
Given that you seem to think highly of your own writing ability
I do, but I've never said that here, as nobody pays me enough (that is, anything) to write all that well here (nor have I received a single response from anyone at least very recently containing enough new and novel information to stimulate my thoughts enough to think I should communicate even better myself to hopefully receive more new and novel information back). (Though I do write well enough, and better than many/most here granting that they're also not getting paid, including many moderators.)
It seems like the calming is partly just out of exhaustion, and because its no longer the 'new hotness'. It was a cultural fad, and such things tend to lose popularity mostly on their own.
Not to say the damage will go away.
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