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cleansingfire

280 karma · joined January 25, 2019

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cleansingfire··on The main thing about Phenylacetone meth is that there's so much of it
P2P synthesis was the standard until it became hard to get (controlled) and that's when ephedrine and pseudoephedrine reduction became popular, despite much higher precursor cost. The reduction pathway is also easier, but because it's so much easier, It's likely much dirtier, since so little care is needed to "succeed." Now that Sudafed and ephedrine Diet pills are controlled, and can't be bought retail by the 1,000 lot, the balance has tilted back to the original precursor.
cleansingfire··on The main thing about Phenylacetone meth is that there's so much of it
No. The war on drugs was an acknowledged political act to disenfranchise black people and the anti (Vietnam) war movement. Lopez, German (March 22, 2016). "Nixon official: real reason for the drug war was to criminalize black people and hippies". Vox. Archived from the original on May 30, 2017. Retrieved June 13, 2017.
cleansingfire··on In 1783, an English rector predicted black holes using classical mechanics
I've heard trespass used that way in the US (prosecute for trespassing) by police officers. It surprised me, but was perfectly clear in context.
cleansingfire··on Peter Pan, Existentialist Fairy Tale? (2017)
I'd downvote this comment as irrelevant whining. Most people who read this didn't downvote you, so you're just wasting our time.
cleansingfire··on How the index helps us to understand, categorise and engage with the world
Almost: This anecdote is in the novel _Cat's Cradle_. His subsequent novels did not have indexes that I recall.
cleansingfire··on Melatonin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know (2018)
No, some people need more than the commercial supplements provide. That's the point. The effective range varies by an order of magnitude. The author denies the actual variety of human needs.
cleansingfire··on The Chief People Officer as PM
And not to be a dick about it (unless absolutely necessary.)
cleansingfire··on Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days
Sure, and I look forward to it. The quote was "everyone... now" but I agree with your modified sentiment.
cleansingfire··on Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days
I just splurged and bought a very used Prius for $3,400, when my $400 car was stolen. I can't afford an EV. Many oriole can't. That dictate just ensures fewer people will be able to afford a car. Which might work with decent public transport.
cleansingfire··on “Great resignation” wave coming for companies
I personally frame any cancelled perq as an effective pay cut. Usually portrayed by management as somehow expected, & as if unearned in the first place, which I find galling. I also had an experienced coworker who pointed out that when the water cooler went away, the company was circling the drain, which my limited experience has borne out.
cleansingfire··on (Red Hat's) 5 useless Linux commands
Also, dc was the math engine for the old RSA in five lines of perl. http://www.cypherspace.org/rsa/pureperl.html Clearly a powerful tool.
cleansingfire··on TI-84 Plus CE Python Graphing Calculator
No Python on these although I love the TI CAS.
cleansingfire··on Exploiting Aliasing for Manga Restoration
While the aliased sample is sharper, I experience an unpleasant artifact in that version based on the halftone dots lining up with pixels, with an effect like grid illusion. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_illusion?wprov=sfti1The blurry character of the original is also unpleasant, but the aliased version is hard for me to look at. I'm interested to know if anyone else experiences this.
cleansingfire··on A centrifugal spin on a 500-year-old air compressor design
If there was liquid with vapor benign in your use case, you could substitute that. Also, since you're doing compression, you would have less water vapor than with something like a water aspirator (vacuum ejector, or Venturi effect vacuum pump.)
cleansingfire··on You Shouldn't Trust Malcolm Gladwell (2014)
He tells compelling stories with intoxicating ideas, but little that's actionable or testable. _Blink_ basically claimed that our intuitive and first decisions are made for real reasons, and often have merit of their own. No surprise, and it's certainly flattering to hear, but useless without suggestions on when to use a quick judgement versus when to take a more considered approach. Some of my instincts are good. Sometimes my first impression is right. Not exactly news, but as presented it implicitly validates snap judgement.
cleansingfire··on “No Defense of the Indefensible”: L.A. Judge Makes Landmark Homelessness Ruling
So to update, it has been appealed: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/federal-judge-orders-lo...
cleansingfire··on “No Defense of the Indefensible”: L.A. Judge Makes Landmark Homelessness Ruling
Interesting that no mention is made of appeal. Is the city willing to embark on this without challenging it? That's almost too much to hope for, so I hate to assume.
cleansingfire··on The Discipline of DE (1978) [video]
Love this since I saw it ages ago, and despite a bit of Burrough's woo, it helped me to be careful, and strive for physical grace, in the things I'm doing. Personally, I tended to physical extravagance, and enjoyed that as a goofy hyper teen, all edges and elbows. This provided a surprising rationale and reminder to move more carefully. Now, I reconsider when I find myself flailing or thrashing, so that instead of pushing harder, or searching for bigger hammers and longer levers, I pause and reconsider. It's a bit of nonviolence to the world that results in care for yourself, with impacts like walking more gracefully, or remembering to turn a wrench so that you don't injure yourself when it slips.
cleansingfire··on Cops “almost 99.9% sure” Tesla had no one at the wheel before deadly crash
It actually has a pretty clear meaning: 99.9% means that someone ignorant (or lacking integrity) wants to project unrealistic certainty. That's what that phrase communicates.
cleansingfire··on Space junk removal is not going smoothly
Slash and burn is ancient agriculture, too. While Wikipedia calls it sustainable, it was only sustainable with approximately no humans, resulting in functionally unlimited land. Larger populations can't wait for the forest regrowth part of the cycle.

/grandiose We are genetically programmed to live for a few decades, reproduce, and care for our kin (both blood and tribe) in a world which was limitless (relative to us as individuals.) I deeply fear this is the sad answer to the Fermi paradox. Now, our survival depends on outsmarting our short-sighted genes.

cleansingfire··on Great Vowel Shift
Not being posh has been fashionable before. A fashion for dropping terminal g existed the upper classes in the 1920's UK. Dorothy L. Sayer's Lord Peter Wimsey did this, and it was fascinating to hear this affectation in the 1970's BBC adaptations with Ian Carmichael. https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/no-g-men-frank-mcnally-on... Also, there is a backlash against Received Pronunciation as inauthentic. Now I enjoy BBC announcers with regional accents, unlike the voices I heard on BBC in the seventies and eighties.
cleansingfire··on Schnorr confirms paper is his, claims it “destroys RSA cryptosystem”
Assuming it works, I'm interested in its limitations. At various complexity levels, there are subsets of problems that yield easily, like unsafe primes in RSA, or trivially, how I can instantly get one factor of an even composite.

Schnorr's main novel claim here seems to be a speedup in finding the SVP and CVP in some cases (he explicitly acknowledges limitations.) A Proof Of Concept seems like it would be great to test for edge cases, and that's where I think the interesting bits are likely to be. Disclaimer: Not a mathematician or complexity theorist. Just here to learn, and glad to be corrected any time.

cleansingfire··on Nvidia's new mining specific GPU announced
Segmenting their market, just like overcharging for underperforming Tesla cards for ai loads. What if they just tried to make good stuff, instead of slicing & dicing to prevent us from using the hardware how we want. Contemptible.
cleansingfire··on Gmail iOS App Has Out of Date Warning After 2 Months of No Updates
They fixed the problem, but turning off the alert.
cleansingfire··on In 1980s Los Angeles, a bank was robbed every hour (2019)
When I lived in East Palo Alto, it was the murder capital of the US. With a carjacking attempt 75' from my front door (foiled by returning with a pistol before they could restart my car) I miss that time not at all.
cleansingfire··on The ever-elusive riddle: What's the best way to cut Christmas cookies?
Now I'm motivated to make an Escher christmas cookie cutter. Thank you!
cleansingfire··on The Lady, or the Tiger? (1882)
He chose to trust his love. He was not certain she would save him, since she was not certain herself. He knew she was jealous. Her had a choice between a quick death and a life without his love (which I wouldn't romanticise, love being more complex than binary.) I don't know what he faced. I do know that I would choose to trust my love, and open her door, as an act of love and trust for us both to have, whatever the outcome.
cleansingfire··on This is Real, That's Not
Determination is orthogonal to happiness. Survivor guilt over what may have been done to survive, demonstrates this.
cleansingfire··on Oracle Moving HQ to Austin
After an aggressive post sales upsell call: "You must buy more licenses" I laughed at them, dropped them, and they went on my "I Don't Work With Bastards" list. Of course one doesn't always have a choice, but with that list in mind, I often end up with more choice than expected. See also: last man on earth, ten foot pole.
cleansingfire··on This is Real, That's Not
When I hear "Money doesn't buy happiness" my internal response is always

"but poverty can ensure misery"

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