Deflation would be bad, for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is that debt defaults, both public and private, would skyrocket. So, no, we don’t want lower prices, as that would certainly mean a significant recession, if not depression.

What people, desperately, desperately need is for their income to AT LEAST keep up with inflation. Any household that doesn’t see their yearly income increase at least as much as the rate of inflation, are getting a pay cut. And when you consider that housing, a ubiquitous, universal human need, has increased in price much faster than the overall rate of inflation, really people probably need their income to increase much more than the base inflation rate.

The US is the dictator of the world, and has been for some time.

Yeah, Trump’s an idiot, but the American people are bigger idiots for voting for him, twice.

I really think we’d be better off just reducing GHG emissions as quickly as possible. I realize we’re not doing that, but that fact doesn’t necessarily make solar geoengineering (or solar radiation management, whatever you want to call it) a better idea. In fact, it might make it a worse idea. Geoengineering should only be done (if at all) in conjunction with rapid reductions in GHG emissions and carbon capture and sequestration. Doing geoengineering without GHG emissions reductions and carbon capture is at best a complete waste and at worst a total disaster.

And the neoliberals/libertarians/anarcho capitalists cheered. Of course people who worship the “free market,” and who believe that governments can only ever do harm and that taxation is theft, want the government to be dysfunctional. Because, ultimately, they don’t want the government to function, at all. Why would they? Why would someone who adamantly believes that governments are always bad want a functioning government?

I’m sure most people will be doing relatively poorly when the inevitable crash occurs. But infinite growth is simply not possible.

https://youtu.be/1bvwOrGn1Zs

People like you are the problem. You don’t actually want to fix anything, you just want to be “right.” You just want your beliefs and preconceived notions to be reinforced and validated.

Yeah, ultimately the problem is our infinite growth paradigm. Infinite growth isn’t sustainable regardless of the energy source. The paradigm will end, one way or another, probably when we hit some hard ecological or resource limit. The resulting crash will be hugely consequential for our species and the rest of the planet.

We’ve really screwed the pooch when it comes to climate change, so far. Most of it is due to greed, corruption, and the incredible influence of the fossil fuels industry, but I think climate activists have hurt their own cause, in some ways.

For whatever reason, climate activists have really focused on EVs, really trying to push rapid adoption through tax incentives and mandates. But the industry wasn’t ready. Profit margins at the lower end of the market, where most car buyers are, were too low due to the still relatively high cost of batteries, so the industry focused on the premium/luxury end of the market where margins were higher. The EV market became flooded with expensive vehicles that there just wasn’t enough demand for. It has resulted in people associating EVs with expensive luxury, and that’s the opposite of what we want for mass adoption. Also, the build out of critical infrastructure has been haphazard. The monopoly tactics of Tesla, and Elon Musk being an insane lunatic haven’t helped either.

But passenger vehicles account for such a small overall percentage of global GHG emissions, I don’t know why so much of the focus was on EVs to begin with. We should have been focused on the real climate change culprit, and that’s electricity generation.

We have shut down a lot of coal power plants, which is definitely a good thing, but most of them have been replaced with natural gas plants, which is not a good thing.

And that brings me to the other big mistake made by many climate activists: they insisted that we focus only on renewables, and refused to support nuclear, even though nuclear is a zero GHG emission technology.

The fact is, renewables are a very different electric generation technology, compared to coal, natural gas and nuclear. The latter can increase output in real time, in response to increases in demand. With renewables, whatever is being generated at any given time is what’s available, and if people want more electricity than what renewables are already putting on the grid, there’s nothing you can do. You can’t throw more solar panels on the fire, so to speak. Renewables just represent a complete paradigm shift in the way we generate and consume electricity. Renewables change the economics of electricity generation and delivery, and we did not adequately anticipate impacts of that.

The question now is: will climate activists recognize these mistakes and change. We’ll see.

No one who speaks German can be an evil man.

If Valve’s expanding hardware lineup helps increase SteamOS adoption, they’ll change their tune.

Who was projecting that global energy related CO2 emissions would increase from 34 gigatons to 50 gigatons between 2014 and 2040? Was that a reasonable projection? What was it based on? Is this evidence of “progress” or inaccurate projecting into the future?

I can project that the murder rate will increase 50% between now and 2050, and then when the murder rate only goes up 10% I can say, “omg, we’ve made such great progress on the murder rate,” even though it still went up, because it didn’t go up as much as I projected it would. But was my projection likely or even feasible in the first place?

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Probably someone who lives in the southern US, where it rarely snows. This wouldn’t be unusual for someone living in many northern states, especially those around the great lakes. But to a southerner, this might as well be a different planet. They will close schools and businesses even for relatively light snow in the South. It frightens and bewilders them.

I know. I was siding with Rand Paul here.

A deal to end the 41-day government shutdown is running into turbulence, thanks to a single Senate objection: Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.).

Senate Republican and Democratic leaders say they need to resolve Paul’s objection to a provision in the government funding package before they can accelerate consideration of the bill. The provision would restrict the unregulated sale of intoxicating…hemp-derived products like Delta-8 at gas stations, corner stores, or online without federal regulation.

I mean, do we really need this provision, right now? I’m not necessarily opposed to federal regulation of Delta-8 products, but can’t we address that at a later date? Let’s get the government open and worry about Delta-8 later.

I don’t think ARM based hardware makes much sense for a desktop, even a mini PC. There are plenty of x86 based mini PCs that are doing just fine. But, ARM based makes so, so much more sense for mobile devices, and just anything that runs on a battery, like a laptop. I would love to see an ARM based Steam deck, for instance. Sure, it wouldn’t necessarily be as powerful, but it would be lighter, quieter, and the battery life would be much better.

We live in a country where the words ‘liberal’ and ‘leftist’ are used interchangeably. We’re dumb.

People who believe strongly in hierarchy, especially what they believe are “natural” hierarchies, are, obviously, opposed to democracy. Democracy is inherently egalitarian, because all voters have exactly the same number of votes: one. In a democracy, the billionaire CEO and the $30,000 a year cashier, have one vote each. No more, no less. The billionaire CEO is more likely to dislike this arrangement because it doesn’t properly respect his “superiority.” It’s ludicrous to the billionaire CEO that a mere cashier should have the same number of votes as him. He might even believe that it is “unnatural,” because he believes that his superiority is something that is innate. He was born superior and he will die superior, and his greater financial success is proof of that innate superiority, and it was inevitable, in his mind.

People want validation not advice, even if that advice could fix their problem.