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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   26593 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 30, 2026

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Just shut up, eat the bug, and install solar panels and a heat pump.

Heat pumps are ubiquitous in new American construction in red states: most don't get cold enough to need a dedicated gas furnace, and already needed air conditioning. Residential solar isn't ubiquitous, but seems popular on all political sides where it's practical: reds like the off-grid resilience. Combustion-based fuels are powering only about 30% of the grid in Texas today, per ERCOT.

Bugs, though, are probably a bridge too far.

Don't knock bugs till you've tried them. I've had crickets and ants in mexico that were delicious, and some sort of beetle and what I'm pretty sure were deep fried silkworms in thailand that were incredible. Like a more meaty peanut.

Remember, shrimps is bugs.

You can de-vein a shrimp. There only so much bug shit I can contemplate eating voluntarily.

Well, uuuh, don't eat shrimps then. Also are you not at all concerned about auto-immune issues wrt chitin in the bug carapace?

Not even a little. I reject basically all influencer coded supplement chugging anti-vax associated info, you would need to show my a meta analysis and I would need to really trust it for me to be worried about chitin. I've been eating mushrooms my whole life for one, and I'm pretty sure they are 15% chitin by weight.

Do arthropods broadly taste like crustaceans?

I remember being very surprised a few years ago to be given alligator and find out it really does taste like chicken. Exactly like chicken, to the point where if you close your eyes you can’t tell the difference. But the line of descent is clearer on that case.

Not in my experience. I've eaten fire ants in the old country just because they got into the food, and I'm not gonna not eat it just because it bites back. They ironically tasted peppery.

The bugs in thailand tasted really nutty, but with even more structure and a kinda meaty, protein sensation. The ant eggs in mexico were rich and kinda fatty, like fish eggs but not fishy.

As for the crickets, I couldn't tell you. I think they were fried, but they were covered in so much salt and spice I just got a pleasant crunchy/oily sensation; like a fried nut but with legs.

I'm not surprised, considering chicken are basically dinosaurs.

Not just basically. Chickens are straight up dinosaurs, while crocodiles are only archosaurs. Peasants.

The lizards --> birds lineage is made very apparent by chickens and roadrunners.

Remember, shrimps is bugs.

I deliberately try to forget this

Remember it and expand! There is a whole kingdom of life you haven't crushed between your slavering jaws yet! Get out there and start eating!

I did enjoy deep fried crickets but realistically they were probably 60%+ fried batter by volume so it wasn't hard to like them lol

Ah yes, the "Was that the cricket or did a bit of spatula get in there by accident? I don't actually care" effect.

I prefer to remember that woodlice (which are ubiquitous in these parts) aren't insects, but are crustaceans. But I hear they don't taste any good.

Shrimp aren’t technically bugs. But yes a lot of conservatives “anti-bug people” eat a lot of things that seem like bugs.

Never asks a southerner chowing down on 2lbs of crawfish why he’s opposed to eating bugs.

I agree and I’ll note that Utah (a red state) has by far the most liberal laws about setting up your own pv systems without having to contract with your utility company (in contrast with states like California where a solar system can easily cost 20-30 k, largely driven by regulatory burden)

I own a home in another state and I’ve looked into replacing the AC (all of which are in great condition) with heat pumps but I haven’t heavily researched the long-term, household upside to them apart from the general environmental benefits to the community. Same with SP’s. The problem with that though is the slope of my roof is very steep and unless a modification or minor construction to it was able to plateau a ledge out for it to absorb the sunlight, I don’t know how much of a gain I’d get from it; but I haven’t done the math on that yet.

I haven't bothered with solar for my house, I have the grid tie already. Maybe when the roof finally gives up.

re heat pumps, if you are a modern softie who runs the heat when it gets below 60 and the ac when it gets above 80, you will see returns in a couple years IF you install it yourself. I don't even know what they cost to install because they are so easy; only the really complicated multihead setups are hard enough I would consider paying someone to do it.

CAVEAT: I would install heads in at most two rooms of a house at most, one bedroom and one office. I feel cooling your whole house defeats the purpose of the efficiency gains.

The issue is getting electrical service to the unit, and getting ahold of an hvac tech that won't rob you blind for to charge it with refrigerant.

I know they sell precharged units somehow, but I don't trust it. Seems like magic.

Precharged units have a special fitting on either end of the lineset that allows them to stay sealed, even when disconnected. There is a higher failure rate, but whether that justifies paying what I'd charge you for side work is in the eye of the beholder and it definitely doesn't justify what a company would charge you. The bigger issue is that this is almost certainly going to be manufactured by an el cheapo manufacturer, so you're not buying the highest quality unit.

Electrical service shouldn't be difficult, if you're not comfortable running power you shouldn't be doing self install.

I would caution anyone running service not for the increased chance of failure, but the increased effect of failure. You fuck up installing the split? you're out a couple thousand and need to do the call of shame.

You fuck up installing 240v? Your house might burn down/you might get to have the penny fuse experience.

Best to shadow someone/get your electrician friend to walk you through it a couple times before fucking with the kills you juice.

Heat pumps will save you money over electric heat, but perhaps not over gas. They may not be able to keep up in the depths of winter, depending on local climate- of course, if this is a vacation house you use only in the summer, that doesn't matter very much. That's about the tradeoff- gas works better and the cost advantage could go either way depending on circumstances, electric furnaces are much more expensive(but do work better) to operate.

No, if you combine them with solar and install them correctly they will for sure.

Worst comes worse, you can do a ground source heat pump, but even as I say that I realize that not everyone is as handy with the shovel and pipe flarer as me, so I should extend some grace.

But then you have to pay for solar.

They may not be able to keep up in the depths of winter, depending on local climate

This is solved if you just buy the right heat pump.

According to IRC § N1108.2.2(14) (part of a complicated section where you have several options for earning 10 "additional energy-efficiency credits"), the recommendation (worth up to 16 credits by itself, depending on your climate zone!) is to buy a heat pump that, at 5 °F (−15 °C), maintains at least 70 percent of the heating capacity that it has at 47 °F (8 °C). You can read the heat pump's specifications to determine whether it meets that requirement. For example:

  • This heat pump has rated capacity of 24 kBTU/h at 47 °F and 19.2 kBTU/h at 5 °F, for a ratio of 80 percent.

  • This heat pump cheats with a backup electric-heating system to maintain 70 percent of rated capacity all the way down to −5 °F (−21 °C).

Combustion-based fuels are powering only about 30% of the grid in Texas today, per ERCOT

Not sure why you are emphasizing this in Texas. It's not that they're using little gas, it's that Texas has had an enormous solar buildout (based) for reasons of having good solar resource and being generally pro-building-stuff (based). In any case Trump himself, and his crew, are not representative of the entire population of Red Tribe or Conservatives but more a culture war caricature thereof, and seem to be solidly in the pocket of Big Fossil, so express only marginally less skepticism of solar than they do for wind (cf. Trump's repeated appeals to Chynese windmills that are a scam which Chyna supposedly doesn't use domestically).

Chyna

I'm sad to see this comment.

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