cato_the_elder

Political correctness isn't the same thing as ethics.

Oh, interesting! I'd never heard of the short/long scale thing before.

You could argue that it's still wrong though, in the sense that the website is in English, and currently the short scale is used in all main Anglosphere countries. [1]

P.S. I just realized that even the short/long scale thing doesn't explain the endmemo.com claim. It's probably just a mistake. In the short scale, a trillion is 10^12, while in the long scale it's 10^18. So, if we were to use the long scale, 1 ppt would a smaller unit by a a factor of 10^-6 (not 10^-3), and equal to 1 fg/L (femto is the SI prefix for 10^-15, while nano is for 10^-9).

In other words, 1 ng/L = 1,000,000 part per long scale trillion.

[1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_and_short_scales#Short_...

I think it's just that Google's instant answer is scraped from endmemo.com, and that website has it wrong.

If you check the second search result (https://www.llojibwe.org/drm/environmental/content/concentra...), it also corroborates what I'm saying:

> 1 nanogram/liter (ng/l) = 1 ppt

Technically speaking, ppt/ppb/ppm should be used for dimensionless quantities, but the convention used here is kinda contrary to that. The argument for the convention is something like this: 1 L ~= 1kg of water, so 10^-12kg of something per 1 L of water can be considered as dimensionless, since the kg and the L cancel out.

> 1 ng/L = 1,000 ppt

I don't think so. See here (the green box in the upper right corner of page 2): https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2015-09/documents/ep...

> nanograms per liter (ng/L) = parts per trillion (ppt)

Or alternatively: https://pubs.usgs.gov/circ/circ1133/conversion-factors.html

I think you have the units, the number of the zeroes, and and the actual figures wrong. Each µg/L is 1,000 ppt (part per trillion, i.e. ng/L).

This is an exaggeration, of course. The EPA guideline of 70 ppt for PFAS is probably just too low compared to other standards. For example, a Canadian guideline suggests an MAC of 200 ppt for PFOA, and 600 ppt for PFOS. These are the most common PFAS. Also, these are based on a lifetime exposure, and short term exposure to these amounts is probably not particularly harmful.

Additionally, even in the US, the guidelines by the individual states vary between 13 to 1000 ppt. [2]

[1]: https://www.canada.ca/en/services/health/publications/health...

[2]: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41370-018-0099-9

The "progressive" case for making things worse.

Later on, it's also just cells. That kind of naive reductionism leads us to reducing a human being to cancer.

Yes, but the people in question are from Nebraska.

No, Nebraska is part of the United States.

I looked at the abstracts of the references you provided, and the first two seem to share the general biases of these kind of studies.

The first Lancet one has this as a finding:

> The abortion rate was lower in subregions where more women live under liberal abortion laws (p<0·05)

They don't seem to have corrected for other factors like rule of law, income, and level of economic development.

The second Lancet one also suffers from the same issue (though at least acknowledge the rule if income), and the authors reveal their biases very soon:

> We developed a new statistical model that jointly estimated unintended pregnancy and abortion that aimed to better inform efforts towards global equity in sexual and reproductive health and rights.

The last one's [1] conclusions seem like they could be broadly correct. If no abortion is allowed at all, you'd expect more maternal deaths. However, the actual amount is disputable as this is based on modelling not concrete data. Additionally, they seem to be assuming a total ban on abortion, which doesn't seem realistic to me.

> But go off and pat yourself on the back for fetuses having more value than the incubation receptacle they're within.

Finally, we need to avoid personal attacks if we are going to have a fruitful discussion.

[1]: https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/7g29k

This is a duplicate with significant discussion in the previous submission, from an outlet with a similar slant: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32401381

> not universally considered a crime it

That doesn't make a difference for me, and most likely for many other people who are against late-stage abortions too. Not all of us are globalists.

If you consider the concrete facts of this particular case [1] (instead of framing it as an abstract privacy or healthcare issue), I think you'd have some sympathy with people who don't find it acceptable.

[1]: https://journalstar.com/news/state-and-regional/nebraska/nor...

Not explicitly, but there are laws against providing illicit access to abortion, and this can be reasonably interpreted as such.

Sure, people respond to incentives. But this one is particularly cruel.

Also, despite all those bogus studies (which, for example, don't correct for how much rule of law is upheld when comparing countries), it will reduce the total number of late-stage abortions significantly. That's a win in my books.

They have to comply with the law, and there's nothing wrong with anti-abortion ads. Facebook doesn't have an obligation to only sell ads to Democrats.

> subequently made that information available to anti-abortion groups

That part is probably misleading, I'm assuming they didn't give them any kind of information, they just allowed demographic targeting like they do for most kinds of ads.

> Isn't that the point of journalism?

I don't think so.

> Rodger Ebert's website literally says critic of movies, host of the show he hosted.

The point is that this guy has put his ideology in his bio ("socialist"), and the rest is explicitly about shitting on tech.

Doctrinaire [1] journalists think they can dictate the future by distorting our view of the present arbitrarily, we need to look beyond them.

[1]: This fella's personal website bio literally says "a socialist writer, host of Tech Won't Save Us,. and critic of tech futures".

And we should remember that there are no angels in a war (or as it seems even after it).

Here's an Atlas Obscura entry about the mass grave of an estimated 6,000 Confederate soldiers detained by the Union as prisoners of war in Chicago: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/confederate-mound

Even the number of people buried there is not known with certainty. And there seems to have been quite a few petitions to remove the monument with the 4,200 known names entirely. [1]

[1]: https://huskiecommons.lib.niu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?articl...

I don't think that naive literalism is the best way to understand this. The term was coined by a psychologist in the 60's [1], and it is clearly designed to sound like the name of a psychological disease.

[1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homophobia#Etymology

> Do US libraries typically offer books that glorify 9/11?

I don't know any such books. If you have a specific one in mind, I will check to see.

But they do carry 9/11 truther books [1], which often claim that it was "an inside job" or "a hoax" or something.

[1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/9/11_truth_movement

> all of which are currently checked out

Which kinda means that they should probably carry more copies, given that it's a 2020 book and still that popular.

> My local library , in an intensely liberal area, also has multiple copies.

Good for them, but sometimes censorship and political manipulation can be more subtle.

> Studies on genetics say otherwise

It's actually not that clear. Like most traits, both genetics and environment play a role.

Also, you are straw-manning the "homophobic" position. Humans have self-control, and having a desire doesn't mean one should act on it.

Opposing censorship doesn't make you a Nazi. I agree that librarians should be paid more though.

Unfortunately, I can't do that here due to privacy reasons, and I only have done that once.

But here's NYPL's new arrivals page: https://www.nypl.org/books-music-movies/new-arrivals

One quick check you can do is to look at the gender of the authors.

Here's the list of the board members: https://www.nypl.org/help/about-nypl/leadership/board-truste...

If I can, I will do a rough headcount of their political affiliation and then update this comment with it.

First of all, those are erroneous and egregious comparisons. Secondly, it's quite possible that your local public library might have a copy of The Anarchist Cookbook [1]. For example, NYPL does carry it. [2]

[1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Anarchist_Cookbook

[2]: https://browse.nypl.org/iii/encore/record/C__Rb21741991

Yes, this is US, not Europe. There are no laws against denying historical events.

If people really want to read things like that, then the publicly funded local liberal should carry them.

In fact, many US public libraries already do carry such books. Here's a search for books by David Irving in the catalogue of Brooklyn Public Library. [1] He is often accused of being a Holocaust denier. [2]

[1]: https://www.bklynlibrary.org/search?search=david+irving

[2]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Irving

And perhaps a demonstration of why democracy isn't always good.

Propaganda, the same way the "phobia" in homophobia is also propaganda.

> We're neutral and carry both sides

Very often, they are not neutral.

Go to your local library's website, and check out the new arrivals section. Most likely, the political bias will be very evident.

Then go to the page where the list the board members, and Google their political affiliation.

Finally, if you are still not convinced, send them an FOIA request to see what books they are discarding from the catalogue.