Favorites August 26th 2021
The amazing thing about this quote is that it's by one of the physicists who did the experiment that showed that classical physics couldn't explain the speed of light!
He did that experiment two years BEFORE uttering this quote.
Paul Graham @paulg
A Software Engineer would point out that as we look closer and closer at the universe, things look messier and messier. Seems like a bad code smell.
“San José has had high parking requirements for years that require more space for parking than for buildings. This creates an environment where it is unfriendly and unsafe to walk, and makes housing more expensive for parking spaces that often go unused.”
Adina Levin @alevin
Requiring everyone build houses for cars to go with any homes built for people has obvious bad implications.
NEW: Since the end of July, the US has evacuated and helped facilitate the evacuation of 101,300 people from Afghanistan.
This morning's latest: 13,400 people over the last 24 hour period.
Since August 14: 95,700 people.
In case you weren't following, the evacuation continues at quite a fast pace. Hopefully we can speed up the visas.
The illusion that we could control events in Afghanistan has been at the base of failure after failure. The refusal to admit that is remarkable.
Given the incredible record of failed American predictions and policymaking about Afghanistan, maybe a bit of humility is in order?
Cooke writes, "COVID-19, by contrast, was — and is — a far, far more difficult challenge."
That's wild. I think we could have matched Canada or Germany or South Korea's performance over the first 6 months.
I don't think Canada, Germany or SK could have remade Afghanistan.
But this is a way the left-right split in this country is not what it seems.
The right doesn't doubt the US government's ability to do extraordinary, seemingly impossible, things. It just doubts its ability to do those things here at home.
Here's the whole piece.
It's not just that they're refusing to get vaccinated, the split predates vaccine availability. But in terms of partisan differences, there is some good news as well:
It doesn't vary by political party, and support for protecting Taiwan from China is also up.
