Favorites November 2nd 2024
Tons of separate governance areas is a very bad way to run things. In Chicago, this article is arguing that many municipalities is what’s allowing graft. Relatedly, did you know that the SF bay area has 27 separate transit agencies.
I'm very excited about the possibilites for solar powered desalination. One thing I often think about is the problem that the desalination facilities themselves are so expensive build that you can't only operate during the day. This article mentions that you can use 'multi-effect distillation" via heat, it's less power efficient, but you can make it mostly out of injection molded plastic so it's fine to only operate when power is super cheap. Here's the full post, I do recommend it.
Longer Reads
• Have you ever heard that the laryngeal nerve has evolved to be wrapped around your heart in a way that seems very inefficient, but can't evolutionarily change. Well, it turns out, there's actually a good reason that it's like that, explained in the linked thread.. TL;DR: it has to do with fetal development and is hard to avoid. (src)(cached)
Flotsam and Jetsam
– Costco is rolling out EV fast charging, they use a bunch of on-site batteries to be able to help manage load. (src)
– The menswear guy can be very nice, LeVar Burton asked for feedback (src)
– Funny arbitrage hack between Amazon and Temu, but it takes advantage of Amazon's very generous return policy, so I suspect if you used it much it would stop working. (src)(cached)
– The Chinese government that was an early signer of the UN charter is now Taiwan. (src)(cached)
– Turns out that there really were big cities up in the mountains, one was found with topological mapping via drones with LiDAR, there may be more. (src)(cached)
– The Washington Post may have been unable to make an endorsement for President, but The Verge went ahead and did one, and after discussion in the doc, they kept in the swears. If you think the WaPo situation is silly though, The Nation's situation is even dumber, though much less important. (src)
– Star Trek Lower Decks got the blue streaks added to the logo for their 5th season, just like TNG did for their 5th season. Fun detail. (src)
– Transcript of Rogan's interview with Trump does not make Trump look good. There are multiple(cached) insane parts. (src)(cached)
– They're probably not gonna revoke Musk's Top Secret clearance for lying about having regular contact with Putin, but it definitely seems bad. Maybe this is why he wants Trump to win so badly? (src)
– Ozempic seems to be associated with a significant reductinon in Alzheimer's disease. (src)(cached)
– Musk and Sacks both seem to think we should bring back the Fairness Doctrine, I don't think they'd actually like the results. (src)(cached)
– Ukraine's POW camps may be better accomidations than North Korean soldiers' homes. (src)(cached)
– Video of a Ukrainian quadcopter taking down a Russian fixed-wing drone. (src)(cached)
– They're making a new Hulk film with basically everyone who has ever played the hulk in it. Playing the very very long game? (src)
– Both parties want the NRC to start allowing new Nuclear power, ubt they keep not allowing it. They're going to have to make staffing changes. (src)(cached)
– News of Fukuyama's death was not accurate, history will still end before he does. (src)(cached)
– Don't go paying your technical debt now, Roon argues that AI will be able to fix it in the next few years. (src)(cached)
– California is considering bailing out homeowners who developed in a landslide risk area, we shouldn't bail them out, but if we do, Max Dubler argues we should pay them their prop13 assessed value. (src)(cached)
– In response to the question of whether the jokes were racist at Trump's Madison Square Garden rally, Popehat gives a useful piece of advice: "if you do ethnic jokes at a roast, you may just be a comic, but if you do ethnic jokes at a Klan rally, you’re definitely a Klansman". Their campaign seems to have heard everyone's claim that it was reminiscent of hte Nazi rally there in 1939, and decided to run wath that. (src)
– Harris advertising on the Las Vegas Sphere (src)(cached)