All these solutions are mean, fruit flies don't do any harm.
In the winter I kind of like them cos I don't have a chance to see insects.
Also let me wax a bit poetic and say how much of a miracle a little thing like a fruit fly is. How long will it be before a 'startup' can make a flying robot of the same size and intelligence? (my bet is on....never)
They fly up my nose at night. We have taken great joy in splitting them in half or flattening them with nerf guns. Pro tip: long barreled guns are the tits.
In terms of theft, just use a beater bike for commuting.
By getting rid of the 'E' part of the bike, you'll get more exercise and won't have to worry about theft.
For years I rode a beater that I found in the garbage and that I fixed up with some parts I had lying around. Later I upgraded to a singlespeed because derailleurs freeze up in the winter.
It's a trek earl. Seriously bikes are so ridiculously efficient why do we need to add batteries and motors and geegaws to them?
It’s true, but also not true.
E-bikes allow a lot of people to cycle who otherwise wouldn’t ride at all.
If you’re reasonably fit, or only use your normal bike on routes you are confident you can ride at your fitness level, then do that with a normal bike.
E-bikes will however free you from doubting you can achieve whatever is in front of you, and that removes a powerful barrier that prevent a lot of people from using bikes at all.
I see lots of elderly people and people of all shapes travelling long distances on e-bikes.
Maybe you don’t get 100% of the benefits of human-powered travel, but if you use the assistance sparingly, you easily get 70-80% of the benefit.
I set le lowest level of assistance of mine to only 15%. Helps me lug the 60lbs of stuff I carry with me on my journeys and I still get a good cardio pushing myself, riding a few hours a day.
I do use a normal bike sometimes, and prefer them for agility and for the pleasure of feeling lighter, but my e-bike is taking me farther and faster (and I’ve lost 15lbs since last year and never felt better in my life than I do now).
Here is why I like my ebike. I'm pushing 50 and out of shape, just hopping on a bike and trying to commute is going to be a disaster. So point one for the ebike, it allows me to ease into a bicycle commute.
Generally on my way to the office I don't want to get all sweaty and have to use the showers, so point two for the ebike. I can use higher pedal assist or lean on the throttle a bit more on the way to work and arrive fresh. On the way home I can turn down/off the pedal assist and ignore the throttle as much as possible to start acclimating myself to a truer bicycle commute.
I rented e-bikes to show relatives around, and they're fantastic if you can't or won't exercise that day. Sometimes it can make the difference between taking the bike or the car.
I see so many people on e-bikes that wouldn't ride a bicycle at all otherwise, and I think "good for them".
I think there were a study that people actually exercised more with ebikes since it allowed them to not get tired so fast, something like how people are doing in gyms: if everything was too heavy, ppl would exercise less compared to when they can choose the difficulty
Some people live in hilly areas. Taking a child to school can go from "nope unless you are top 1% fit people in the world" to "quite the workout". You can turn the motor off on flat terrain.
I feel the same way, but if “e” is what it takes to get more people on bicycles, I’m not gonna argue with them.
Incidentally, I also custom built a “mini velo” similar to the author’s “orange city bomber.” It really is the best bicycle for urban environments, pure fun, no idea why they aren’t more popular in the states.
Acute onset ME/CFS is also frequently linked to a viral infection.
I think there is a lot of overlap with burnout too.
Basically when you are in a chronic state of stress from work or other factors, a viral infection can be the straw which breaks the camel's back, which can provoke a burnout.
I think it's time for a 'war on viruses'. Pick the top 10 viruses by human impact (both initial infection and suspected ongoing health degradation). Make mRNA vaccines for each, and spray them from a plane over major cities.
Repeat every month as new variants start to spread.
Consider it a 'nationwide immune system'.
Would there be ethics problems - surely yes. But if it can be shown to save lives, can we ethically not do this?
Seeing how the Covid vaccine is measurably saving lives and how the republicans managed to make it a political issue and a matter of “personal choice”, you can be sure there are no chances of that happening. The period of doing things for the greater good and mandating vaccine is just over
I have to laugh at this 'not in my body' argument when a lot of people making it are putting all sorts of stuff in their bodies which are very questionable: sucking down sugary drinks all day, eating junk and processed foods, even taking street drugs (who knows what in that).
Let's cut to the heart of it, this 'not in my body' argument is just a rationalisation for an oppositional personality trait.
Hey, I hate being told what to do, but I don't push it to the point where I refuse to do something which benefits me.
That's not the issue, it's that Republicans played down the dangers of Covid while playing up the dangers of the vaccines. It's okay to decide what goes in your body, it's not okay to lie to people to influence their decision what goes in their bodies.
Covid isn’t actually that dangerous for the vast majority of people. We have almost four years if data showing that.
The vaccines dangers are questionable. There are huge incentives to cover up any dangers and pharmaceutical companies and governments have a long history of covering up dangerous medial products and drugs.
For most populations, covid is not nearly as dangerous as what got pushed by the media. We have tons of actual data to back that. The median age of death from covid is higher than the average life expectancy of a human. Most healthy people under the age of like 70 will handle covid just fine. This is an absolute fact that downplays nothing.
There is nothing that isn't a fact about what I just said. I'm not downplaying anything. You are, in fact, overplaying the risks of covid. Which itself is a form of misinformation that somehow has been allowed to continue to circulate.
> For most populations, covid is not nearly as dangerous as what got pushed by the media. We have tons of actual data to back that.
What danger got "pushed by the media"? Are you talking about right-wing media that downplayed the dangers all along ("it's just a flu!")?
> The median age of death from covid is higher than the average life expectancy of a human. Most healthy people under the age of like 70 will handle covid just fine. This is an absolute fact that downplays nothing.
Sure. Most healthy people will still benefit from the vaccines, as they lower the chance for long Covid for the ~10-15% of healthy people who don't handle Covid just fine, and it - you know - keeps those not healthy and under 70 from dying. Small things like that.
> There is nothing that isn't a fact about what I just said. I'm not downplaying anything. You are, in fact, overplaying the risks of covid.
Where have I done that? You just went off and said "it's not that dangerous" without even stating what you're comparing the level of danger to. You were, literally in the most literal sense, downplaying the dangers of Covid while talking up the dangers of the vaccine.
Once you unsubscribe to political tribalism you will see how badly your tribe played you.
Trust me. I was you before these lockdowns. I even phone banked for Obama. I had nightmares when trump was elected. I sneered and disowned trump people. Now I’m a political orphan who will probably never again vote (D).
My (former) political party tossed literally their entire platform to hitch onto covid hysteria.
Stop playing tribalism. It isn’t healthy and sets you up to get played. We are all just people. Most of us are right in the center just trying to live. Both parties are authoritarian, fascist assholes that want to steal your rights.
Covid was and is real but it turned political and not in the way you think. You and a lot of other people like me got badly, badly played. Once you realize that, all the mental gymnastics required to support your takes on covid melt away. And even better, you can finally stop hating other people. Unfortunately it also means you’ll have to accept you probably wasted three years of your very short life playing covid theater and getting all worked up about other people (rightfully) disregarding all of it…
Covid and other recent phenomenon have really turned tribal affiliations on their head. In America this is dems vs republicans, but there seem to be nearly equivalent factions in most western nations. I've had a similar trajectory to yours (worked on democratic campaigns, etc), but I drifted outside the tribe bit by bit and was fully out by the time Clinton secured the nomination.
It's not hard to see that each of these factions have taken views (quite stridently in fact) that would have been anathema to their positions not all that long ago. Views can evolve, but we're talking about total reversals in a very short period of time.
This is fine with me, but what's been very eye-opening is listening to the same people who were stridently in favor of view X just a few years ago are now stridently in favor of Not-X, and not only that, they think you're a monster for thinking X.
It's not R vs D, it's tribalism, as you said. I just didn't realize how strong it is and how close-minded it makes people to alternate views. Belonging is clearly an incredibly strong thing in humans, the need for it seemingly making suspension of disbelief involuntary. I'm aware I'm probably _still_ stupidly believing things for no reason than some group I like thinks it, so this isn't me being superior. It's just something we as humans should be wary of.
> Once you unsubscribe to political tribalism you will see how badly your tribe played you.
> Trust me. I was you before these lockdowns. I even phone banked for Obama. I had nightmares when trump was elected. I sneered and disowned trump people. Now I’m a political orphan who will probably never again vote (D).
My guy, I'm not even from America, and I don't cleanly fit into your political system. It's pretty rich of you to say "I was you" when I haven't stated my own position so far. Yes, I know, you want to project your own journey onto me to make it seem like you're more evolved than me - that's what enlightened centrists who just so happen to veer right always say. But if you jump the gun and start this before I clearly state my own position it will just make you look like... well, like you do now.
> My (former) political party tossed literally their entire platform to hitch onto covid hysteria.
Really? The Democrats left their entire platform behind? If I were to compare Bidens platform today with Obamas from 2012 there would be no overlap? Nothing about healthcare, or social services, or taxes etc?
> Stop playing tribalism. It isn’t healthy and sets you up to get played. We are all just people. Most of us are right in the center just trying to live. Both parties are authoritarian, fascist assholes that want to steal your rights.
I'm an outsider looking into the clusterfuck you guys call politics. I'm stating my subjective views as such. What you call tribalism I call "human decency" - calling out people who downplay the dangers of a virus for example is something we should all do for those who can't anymore, because they died.
> Covid was and is real but it turned political and not in the way you think. You and a lot of other people like me got badly, badly played. Once you realize that, all the mental gymnastics required to support your takes on covid melt away. And even better, you can finally stop hating other people. Unfortunately it also means you’ll have to accept you probably wasted three years of your very short life playing covid theater and getting all worked up about other people (rightfully) disregarding all of it…
The funny thing is that you haven't stated any single specific thing that got changed, or that I should change my mind on, or that signifies your move to "the center" (as you call it). It's all just platiudes and big nebulous terms ("my former political party tossed literally their entire platform", "you and a lot of other people like me got badly, badly played", "all the mental gymnastics required to support your takes on covid melt away"). Is it possible for your to say anything of value?
Sorry, but I think the person you are responding to is probably technically correct in this case. Many people formed their opinions about COVID during the early pandemic where there were lots of breathless articles about children dying,
COVID risk seems to be mostly related to other, known risk factors that are personalized.
This is supported by most current medical literature.
I don't climb, or at least not hard enough for my opinion on climbing to be relevant, but I came to realise for myself that my mountain biking was a form of counterphobia.¹
There is a famous trail builder who built super risky trails in the North Shore of Vancouver. Those trails involved riding along six inch wide logs which were all slimy and slippery way above the forest floor.²
My bonafides: I've ridden everything on Fromme and most trails on Seymour too, back in the day before they cut down the most dangerous lines.
Basically, I just wanted to say that from those riding experiences, that I get it. I know that feeling of being one with the trail, of fully accepting and merging with the fear. It brought me peace during the ride (it altered my perception till all I could see was the front tire and the line I was riding, everything else became bokeh) and the comedown after riding trails like that was also really nice.
Driving home across the Lions Gate bridge with my bike in the back of my friends shitty pickup (the bike was likely worth more than the car) are probably some of the happiest memories I'll ever make.
> I see nothing here but potentially, literally, wasting your life.
Funnily enough, I wondered the other day whether all the time I spent sitting in a chair having petty arguments with a computer (aka.programming) to have been a waste of my life as well.
Are you seriously suggesting that the indigenous were practising controlled burns over millions of hectares of boreal forest?
I find this 'sweep your floors' meme a bit of an oddity:
1. It involves conservatives casting native americans in a good light. Who's going to argue with that?
2. It contains a false epiphany which just feels right (the solution to forest fires is...fires)
3. It contains a grain of truth. Native americans did perform controlled burns, and in the NW they did take care of salmon streams etc, but not on a scale that would prevent today's wildfires.
It's a classic diversion from climate change, and our terrible 'foresty' practices of cutting down forests and planting monocrops of high resin species all packed together and calling it reforestation and finally, spraying entire valleys with roundup (often where indigenous people live of course)
We've effectively stopped this with modern fire suppression techniques and have fewer managed burns...Parks Canada only had 12 last year. And here's a story where they ran out of funding and had to defer burns:
> the only difference between a canadian and an american is a line on a map
Kindly keep this kind of ignorant viewpoint to yourself.
There are a lot of differences, and if you can't or won't see them that not our problem.
As a Canadian, I don't want your two party political structure (soon to be one maybe?) and your supreme court of mostly old clerics making decisions based on their religious views in my country thanks. Or shall we talk about your daily mass shootings?
If you guys think that is working for you, so much the better for you.
You know @dang, I appreciate what you're trying to foster here, but despite that I think that some of the commenters on this site are keeping people away.
My friend—who is much more restrained in speech than I am—and I were saying that we don't like to come to the 'orange site' as much as before, despite the sometimes excellent discussions, and though it's hard to say precisely why, the reason we came up with is the libertarian slant.
You are doing a great job keeping the tone civil, but I think in the end it just leaves us with a community made up of say 33% of people politely saying impolite things.
By controlling the tone, could it be that our trolls have just learned to deliver their absolutist, unfeeling and insensitive comments in polite language?
We can detect tone but not intent, right? So we control the tone, but the trolls here (and no doubt about it we have them like anywhere else) have just learned to sealion people.
And I stand by the provocative nature of the parent post.
What if he/she had said 'The difference between a Russian and a Ukrainian is just a line on a map?' That is a politely stated idea. Would a Ukrainian have to take that with restraint too?
Certainly the parent post was provocative. That's why I moderated it and asked the user not to post like that again. I'm not clear on what else you think I should have done?
It doesn't change the fact that you also broke the site guidelines by taking the bait and responding with an outright flamewar post. People need to follow the rules regardless of how provocative another comment is. Otherwise we get a downward spiral (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...).
We don't think in terms of civility on HN; I haven't used that word in years except to tell people we don't use that word. We're going for kindness, which is something quite different.
> You definitely don't speak for us all, whatever the case.
Yeah OP doesn't speak for me either. While this might not be implemented in the best way, Canadian culture is a real thing, but only because we are active in trying to protect it.
And it goes double for French Canadian culture! I don't want my province to become another Louisiana, i.e.: a once French speaking region that is now nearly 100% anglophone, but hey there's this great French influence!
Also FB puts news orgs in a bind because in order to compete, they need to give their content away for free on Facebook.
This has put the squeeze on an industry that was already bleeding money from all the ads moving online.
Because we are a small news market, this has been especially damaging to our journalism industry. If we lose it then it will be foreigners telling us what the 'facts' are in our own country, no thanks.
Aren’t the French Canadians notorious for buying and consuming their own culture?
Friend of mine here in the bay area is French Canadian and his teenagers (both full Americans born here) both watch and follow French Canadians on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube.
He explained to me that under Canadian law, absolutely none of that is Canadian Content or Culture. No subsidies, no quotas. Even a Denis Villeneuve movie isn't either.
Apparently, to watch original content in French he has to VPN in Canada to be allowed to watch content that's only produced in Canada for French Canadians by CBC; they won't even make the smallest attempt at exporting it.
Quebec is basically a confederate state that periodically holds a brexit referendum to threaten the rest of the country, and we all kiss their ass for a while and (so far) the secession No votes win out, for twenty years or so, rinse, repeat.
The cancon rules play out in absurd ways on a regular basis; there was a case where a Bryan Adams album didn't qualify but an Aerosmith album did due to where it was recorded, and while I never looked too closely at either case I'm sure there was some bureaucratic discretion exercised somewhere along the way.
That said, Cancon will always get my vote, I think we do have a distinct set of musical conventions from other places and it's got a lot to do with the government assistance.
Well, they have racist laws aimed mainly at a specific group, and they literally have voted twice in my life about leaving Canada and shortly before I was born they had an IRA style terrorist group called the FLQ.
It's a pretty loaded situation.
Cause we're neither French nor English
Parle Anglais ou Francis
We hate each other like the plague
And we hope it stays that way
That's not at all like the US Confederation or Civil War.
> they had an IRA style terrorist group called the FLQ.
Did they actually get convicted under terrorism laws? From my understanding, it was a series of mailbox bombing, some of them by the feds themselves. [0] Nothing remotely looking like 9/11.
The laws in question are framed as secularist, but aimed at Muslims who dress differently. I daresay nobody who wears a crucifix in that highly catholic province is going to get much hassle, but wear a hijab, on the other hand...
I'm not particularly interested in a contest of anti-wit where you try to convince me the government of Quebec are actually superduper committed anti-religionists and I get increasingly frustrated, but I definitely consider it a law based in racist motivation and which is playing out in a highly racist way, just like the crack laws down there in the 90s were targeted at black people. Superpredators and all that.
Anyways I'm not sure what you're after here - is it that, the Confederate South was the pinnacle of racism? And nothing should ever be compared to it, because that's insulting to the pride of the generations of Southern Racists who have worked very hard to successfully maintain an aura of abject Hun-like barbarism against a tide of woke PCism that grows ever more powerful?
Am I making you feel like maybe, as an American, your racism is maybe not as remarkable as you think it is, and in fact, is just another case of US exceptionalist ego tripping? I mean, let's face it, Jefferson Davis was no Hitler, and neither is whoever is running Quebec right now, they're all just boring assholes throwing red meat to their boring fans.
And lest you think I'm some sort of Anglo nationalist, no, I live on Treaty One Territory and I despise my own government just as much for the exact same reasons. It's the same everywhere, dude - you people just have more guns and less self-control about it.
The law specifically bans the wearing of religious symbols or garb, is my understanding, for gov employees.
But the question is not what the law says, but how it is applied, and to whom, which gets lost in the transition to the paper trail.
edit: A good way to think about it, IMO, is to remember for a moment that everything a politician does is performative - whether they believe it or don't, every public action is actually a pantomime which is intended to please or appease. With that in mind, who is Quebec pleasing or appeasing with this law? Atheists? Please.
Another comparison one could draw, and perhaps a more apt one than the confederacy, would be to Utah, where it's known that if you try to do business there, it is not a secular government and you need to either bribe or work around the church. Quebec enjoys a similar license to pass shit laws/policies that do not pass the Charter, and the feds do nothing because they'll just have another referendum about it.
In the winter I kind of like them cos I don't have a chance to see insects.
Also let me wax a bit poetic and say how much of a miracle a little thing like a fruit fly is. How long will it be before a 'startup' can make a flying robot of the same size and intelligence? (my bet is on....never)