bra4you

I saw this solved with a USB stick on a keychain and the computer shuts down when the stick is removed. Does anybody still have the link?

Ah. Found it: https://tech.michaelaltfield.net/2020/01/02/buskill-laptop-k...

" is that time is just an emergent property "

This guy says, it is the other way around:

https://www.quantamagazine.org/were-stuck-inside-the-univers...

Short answer: No

Long answer: https://ourfiniteworld.com/2011/02/21/there-is-no-steady-sta...

This is a pretty good answer. With cash you are total contrarian in the current environment. But this strategy also comes with risk. "Haircut" etc.

"Assets? Physical, material goods? Or investment vehicles like bonds and funds?"

Everything.

"What happens when the bubble bursts?"

Good question. High inflation? Strong recession? Or decades of stagflation? Everything is possible. The future is hard to predict.

"What doesn't lose value? Who doesn't wind up underwater?"

"No place left to hide".

"But overly tight money is really really not the way to make land affordable."

It is the other way around. Please google "asset price inflation".

"It's an exceptionally destructive approach." Only in your head my friend.

"Prices of houses may be high but affordability is not because of cheap financing."

A 7 fig house still costs 7 figures. In many countries you can not lock in the interest rates for 30 years but they get re-adjusted after 10 or 15 years. Could be a bad awakening for some.

"Asset prices are bounded by the cost of producing new houses"

1. "asset prices" are not only houses. But also Stocks for example

2. The most expensive thing is most of the time not the house but the land. "Buy land, they stopped making it! - Mark Twain"

Read a few books about economics dude.

"I tried to explain why here"

Well, you failed. Interest rates are historically low. We have seen a gigantic amount of liquidity injected over the last decades.

"The poor are much much more hurt by overly tight money."

What is the most expensive acquisition in their life for the majority of the people? Real Estate. Prices are through the roof thanks to the central banks. Young people are just getting priced out of the market.

Real helicopter money has not been tried yet.

"I wish western world central banks were as competent." Well...

"Western world central banks tend to pressure prices down during economic shocks by withholding liquidity."

Well, we have seen gigantic quantitative easing in the US and the EU and also in China. Inflation - I assume that is what you mean by "pressure prices down" - keeps elusive. Japan has tried for decades to create inflation.

The only thing that the central banks in the world have managed is to create a gigantic asset bubble, via the so called "asset price inflation". They basically build a cash pipeline to all the asset holders. Make the rich richer and the poor poorer.

"Is that a universal truth, or is it historical? Situational?"

It it experience based on historical data. A virus jumping to a new host (species) will be more aggressive in the beginning until it has adopted (mutated) to his new host.

While this is not a universal truth, it is experience and could also be backed up mathematically (>host dies to soon, virus can not spread) and by game theory.

Yes. But not threatening for the human population at all.

AFAIK the flu vaccine is terrible ineffective. I would have to google numbers but the reliability is low.

"I suspect that “chance of dying” varies based on treatment, "

I doubt this. WHile this may be true for a known disease, we have to ask, how much can the hospital do in this cases? It is a little bit like HIV in the beginning. Watch them die?

Interestingly, China is trying HIV medications on the infected.

>50 years is not old. I don't know what is considered old but I know that >75y has a two magnitudes higher mortality rate with the flu.

I doubt that the 50 years old Hospital doctor who died had any serious per-existing health condition. In fact, you could argue hat most doctors have a stronger immune system than average since they are exposed to more germs due to their profession. So this 50y old professional dropping dead is a bad sign! (and hands off to him for his bravery in doing his job).

You could only argue that he cough the strain very early. A virus jumping into a new species is more aggressive at the beginning, later it adopts more to the new host and becomes less aggressive.

Edge Router X looks interesting. Is there a Raspberry now that offers Dual Gigabit Internet Ports (2XGBit)?

"I don't know what you are trying to say here."

You pic a time frame, were China was indeed ahead. But I mentioned this time frame myself and it was the only time.

>> The reason why Europe explored more during that time says more about China than Europe. > No. It says more about Europe than China.

Yes. It basically tells us, that while China was ahead, the culture had big weaknesses. So big, that they left the world for Europe. What happened to Zheng He?

"Yes. China has superior products that europe desired and ran a deficit..."

You are right with the deficit. They did not have superior products, they had unique products (silk, tea, porcelain) and only wanted to export but never buy anything. Not so different from today. They always said, in the arrogance "we don't need anything!". After the military trouble with the west, they realized there was something they should have bought. Technology.

> It wasn't bullshit. Generally, the merchants and voyagers who reached china were in awe.

Well, this was after Rome, and while after the middle ages, still before the industrial revolution.

> It was why europeans wanted to get to china in the first place and not the other way around.

The reason why Europe explored more during that time says more about China than Europe.

"Even decades after the opium wars, europeans were still in awe even while burning and pillaging."

Why should they? Even if they are writings about "superior culture" from that time, we had Roman writers write too about "superior Germanic culture" (bellum germanicum). By the way, do you know why the Opium war happened? Besides having the inferior technology on the Chinese side? Do you know what the reasons was? It should be a warning to China today.

What is Chinese Culture? If nothing else, the writing system? Putonghua was only adopted in all of current China under Mao.

I could also talk of the "western culture" and take Sanskrit and all indu-germanic languages that are descendant from it - so basically nearly all of the European languages" as "one culture".

I think there is little doubt that Rome was en pare with China. I don't see me shifting definitions of the West. You could argue that I switch between Egypt and Rome. While not the same culture, they are interconnected and influenced each other (visit the Vatican if you have any doubts).

I looked up "ancient history": "Although the ending date of ancient history is disputed, some Western scholars use the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD"

China was far inferier compared to Egypt of that time. For now, lets consider Egypt be part of my "western" argument.

So when between the Highs of Egypt and the rise of Rome was China superior in technology? I admit, out of my head, that Asia may have had the far greater GDP product based on the number ob people. But I don't see any Asian or Chinese superiority.

"with the West exploding out of nowhere." Ignoring the Cultures and Empires of Egypt and Rome is a bit of a stretch.

"But that is probably just a blip, and in the grand scheme we will probably end up with China and the Near East rising again."

Doubt it. The Chinese culture has tremendous strength. But, as often, it comes with tremendous weaknesses.

Since we talk about empires. I know what Rome, what the Soviet Union, what Islam, what "America" had or has to offer. What does China has to offer?

"Until the Opium War of 1840–42 the European merchants and voyagers who reached the distant land of China had looked upon the Chinese with a good deal of awe as a people of superior culture."

Bullshit and Chinese Propaganda with their "5000 years old culture".

5000 years ago we are talking about bones inscribed with precursors of the Chinese writing system. Not bad, but compare this to the Pyramids at the same time?

Around the year 0 the Chinese culture was en par with the level of western culture and technology - speak Rome.

Only during the middle ages the west fell so far beyond and Chinese had indeed a superior level of technology, knowledge and administration. Things reversed again with the industrial revolution and the center of industrial GDP moved to the west again. Now since China and the rest of Asia has also industrialized and due to far more people in Asia, the center of world GDP has shifted back to the East.

If you can really talk about a "continuous civilization" for 5000, 3500 or even 2000 years is doubtful.

The experience from businessman with Chinese: 30 years ago they had an inferior complex because they were technological too far behind and a feeling of cultural superiority. Now the have the feeling of technological superiority combined with cultural superiority.

Chinese culture has a lot of strengths. But it also comes with a lot of weaknesses. I am skeptical about the "Chinese Century"

They were idiots when they laughed. The Soviet Union was actually leading in this for a long time (Georgia).

Me too. But lets not forget, we are dealing with 16 years old kiddies here.

But for you: https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/07/galactic-scale-energy/

Downvote -4?

The voting system here lets me question the sanity and competence of many readers here.

For those interested:

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Proposals for such inoperable machines have become so common that the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has made an official policy of refusing to grant patents for perpetual motion machines without a working model. The USPTO Manual of Patent Examining Practice states:

    With the exception of cases involving perpetual motion, a model is not ordinarily required by the Office to demonstrate the operability of a device. If operability of a device is questioned, the applicant must establish it to the satisfaction of the examiner, but he or she may choose his or her own way of so doing.[25] 

And, further, that:

    A rejection [of a patent application] on the ground of lack of utility includes the more specific grounds of inoperativeness, involving perpetual motion. A rejection under 35 U.S.C. 101 for lack of utility should not be based on grounds that the invention is frivolous, fraudulent or against public policy.[26] 

The filing of a patent application is a clerical task, and the USPTO will not refuse filings for perpetual motion machines; the application will be filed and then most probably rejected by the patent examiner, after he has done a formal examination.[27] Even if a patent is granted, it does not mean that the invention actually works, it just means that the examiner believes that it works, or was unable to figure out why it would not work.[27]

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"I guess you can actually patent a perpetual motion machine"

No, you can't because it violates fundamental principles of scientific laws.

Honestly, I have lost track of state of matters. How many are there? 3? s,l,g? Plasma? Bode Einstein Condensate? I vaguely remember at least three more.

"Harvoni costs $94,500 for a 12-week treatment Mavyret costs $39,600 for a 12-week treatment Zepatier costs $54,600 for a 12-week treatment Technivie costs $76,653 for a 12-week treatment"

I assume that your healthcare covers this. Otherwise cheap imports are available from India, e.g. https://roidgear.net/hepatitis-c