Hacker News Reader

Hacker News

Comment by neodypsis | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

neodypsis

> The problem of relying on Russia for energy was obvious.

Indeed. Always found it strange that Germany didn't see a problem with relying on Russia for their main energy source.

View on HN

Motivated reasoning. Cheap energy is extremely attractive, so seemingly obvious downsides can be swept under the rug.

I think this is very human reasoning.

People laugh at Preppers and call them crazy for taking prudent preparedness steps as insurance against future risks. It's a very human thing to do.

During the early days of COVID, some people started coming around to preppers being not-so-crazy-after-all, which lasted for precisely a few months before the toilet paper returned and preparedness being an acceptable idea left mainstream thought.

Expediency and lifestyle will always trump prudence in the human mind. It's the primary reason we will eventually exterminate ourselves, regardless of the specific existential risk we succumb to. The Great Filter is no great mystery.

> People laugh at Preppers and call them crazy for taking prudent preparedness steps as insurance against future risks. It's a very human thing to do.

I think most of the time people are laughing at preppers on TV. Having an emergency radio, a gun, extra water storage, a back-up generator, etc. - I haven't experience many people who laugh at that, though certainly I imagine someone exists who does. The government publishes info on emergency disaster preparedness kits and other things too.

Due to Earthquakes, California asks that you have at least 3 days of supplies on hand at all times, with 7 days of supplies being prefered and 14 days of supplies being the best. Same thing from my county and city. They all know that when "The Big One" hits, your average citizen is going to be on their own for at least a couple of days.

Do they have stats on when to expect it?

The same time a 9.0 is due in the Midwest... any day now.

If everyone waits with getting their supplies until they expect to need them, then there won't be enough in stock to supply everyone with their 7-days of supplies.

Germans would have happily helped train Russian military if 2014 did not happen. Money's good.

Where did you get that idea from? Without looking it up, I suspect Germany, as a NATO country, helped Ukraine as other NATO allies did. And supported the orange revolution, as the other EU nations did before 2014.

Germany (along with France and others) supplied military-related stuff to Russia, even after 2014.

Under contracts signed before 2014. Seems like a detail worth mentioning.

EDIT: Which is bad reason, but at least an understandable when it comes to foreign policy. And it is not that arms exports are actually hindered by morals, all the exports to Saudi, UAE, Mexico and every other crisis region show otherwise. Personally, I think the West shouldn't export to those countries or conflict zones. The West also needs the industrial base to maintain reasonably strong militaries so, and with defense spending being a less than popular thing after the Cold War ended, exports are necessary for that. This could change so, and already did in Germany with additional military spending.

https://www.dw.com/en/rheinmetall-poised-to-honor-military-d...

Some quick numbers: 2020/21 exports of weapons from EU cointries to Russia were aroind 100 million (or thereabouts, might even include icebreakers, good luck using those for conquering Mariupol). Since February 2022 EU countries committed to send 2.5 billion of military gear to the Ukrainian forces.

I guess details and context still matter.

Context is also that Russia trained their invasion forces in a modern German built facility.

Unless said facility was build after 2014 I don't see the problem here. Not that the training was very successful as far as all that invasion business goes, was it?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com