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knz

1,959 karma · joined December 9, 2011

8ofr.com
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knz··on What happened to the dream of the Pan-American highway?
Surely HSR linking Europe and Asia would preceed a trans Pacific route?
knz··on Live worm found in Australian woman’s brain
https://www.cdc.gov/parasites/taeniasis/index.html

It's from raw/undercooked pork and beef.

knz··on U.S. successfully flight-tests Raytheon hypersonic weapon
They have options, including platforms such as https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_X-37
knz··on Two-minute battery changes push India’s delivery riders to switch to e-scooters
Five seconds to get up to highway speeds isn't outrageous in many parts of the country where there are short on ramps and fast moving traffic.

And that's in ideal conditions - real world could easily have multiple passengers and a full load of luggage/cargo that'll slow things down.

Likewise with going 120mph - highway speeds are anything from 60 to 85mph. Most vehicles aren't at 100% engine load when cruising on the highway.

knz··on Report on Stablecoins [pdf]
> And after ten years, there isn't one actual application of cryptocurrencies except for speculation and crime.

Remittances - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remittance

There is a vast market for efficient, fast, and affordable methods of transferring money/wealth across political boundaries. Blockchain/crypto seems to be filling that niche for many people, myself included, without "speculation and crime" being a factor. There is no "remittance app" for it because you can do it with your pick of various widely available crypto coins and exchanges.

knz··on New Zealand’s consensus for Covid zero is finally cracking
Yes, many of my family and friends are in Auckland.

I don't mean it hasn't caused any disruption - only that the disruption prior to this outbreak was minimal compared to much of the world over the last 18 months.

knz··on New Zealand’s consensus for Covid zero is finally cracking
> Covid zero is an ideological pipe dream unless NZ wants to permanently ban international travel

The goal of eliminating COVID there is to reduce the burden on the healthcare system during an active global pandemic. Until recently NZ had very low vaccination rates - zero COVID as a policy was closely tied to this and few (none?) of their mitigation measures will be permanent.

I'm a dual US/NZ citizen with family on both sides of the Pacific. It's almost comical how much negativity there is outside of NZ towards their COVID strategy, especially when you consider how minimal the disruption had been until this most recent outbreak.

knz··on OpenFlights – airport and airline data
Nice job on your community website!

You may already be aware of this but if you want real-time ADS-B, check out PiAware (https://flightaware.com/adsb/piaware/) as a low cost option to run your own ADS-B ground station via a raspberry pi.

knz··on US agencies call for pause in Johnson & Johnson vaccine
My family history includes some "adventures" with blood clots/PE's.

Typically they investigate with multiple tools - a CT scan, a D-Dimer blood test, and often an ultrasound to check blood flow in limbs etc.

knz··on Whistleblower: Ubiquiti Breach “Catastrophic”
> Hopefully this account isn't fully truthful

Brian Krebs is a reputable source who has a lot to lose if he makes unsubstantiated claims.

knz··on U.S. fears China attack on Taiwan
Not to mention we are twenty years into the Global War on Terrorism.

The appetite of the US public for another conflict, especially one directly against a superpower, is exceptionally low.

knz··on Is that ship still stuck?
There are comments further down explaining how the containers likely weigh substantially more than the lift capacity of heavy lift helicopters. They'd have to partially unload the contents of each individual container first.

And if you're unloading, the human labor cost to unload the whole container is probably cheaper than the cost of running a fleet of helicopters for weeks to months.

knz··on Emirates’ Tim Clark says Boeing ‘not getting it’ on 737 Max, 787
> comparing planes they've flown on

The airline matters too - some have larger seats with more amenities and more space between rows. Those extra inches really matter on long haul flights for those of us who are tall!

knz··on We Expect 300k Fewer Births Than Usual This Year in the US
> In the end the world will be a stark 0.001% who own the automation and the flat 99.999% who subsist on leisure and boredom.

Leisure? Or poverty?

This strikes me as a return to the default state for much of human existence and the current reality for much of the world's population.

knz··on 'New car smell' is the scent of carcinogens
> I also love that it’s emulating a scent that’s from off gassing that we’ve known for years is probably terrible for you.

Is an artificial air freshener much better from an air quality perspective though?

knz··on 8-Year-Old Calls Out NPR for Lack of Dinosaur Stories
PBS has a show called "Dinosaur Train" that kids seem to love - https://pbskids.org/dinosaurtrain
knz··on Show HN: Haven – Run a private website to share with only the people you choose
> long thought there was room for a private network

MyFamily.com was essentially this in the pre Facebook era. IIRC there was a modest annual fee for a private site/feed that let you share posts, photos, and recipes with family members.

knz··on US intelligence agencies have 180 days to share what they know about UFOs
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_X-37

We know that they have similar technology in production today (using more conventional technology but with the same result).

It's also likely no coincidence that "Space Force" is a thing now.

knz··on How the U.S. Used Disinformation and the 'Jakarta Method' to Change the World
> better yet, they could have bombed Germany too but thats another story.

The atomic bombs were dropped in August 1945. Germany surrendered in May of 1945, before the Trinity test (first test of a nuclear device) in July!

> I'd like to point out the two bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki as retaliation for Pearl Habour.

This is far too simple - it's widely accepted that there were multiple reasons for using the bombs that do not include simple revenge. Most notable were the estimates of allied casualties to invade mainland Japan after the experience of clearing islands during the Pacific campaign.

It's also worth noting that consent to use the bombs was required and given by the British per the Quebec Agreement of 1943.

knz··on Notes on My Colon Cancer
Not to discredit the potentially valid concerns of these articles but it's not quite accurate to say these aren't an improvement.

I'm a few weeks out from a robotic assisted surgery related to kidney cancer and the recovery time is significantly shorter in duration (6 weeks instead of 3-6 months) than the non robotic surgery. My understanding is that the DaVinci surgical robot also allowed them to be more precise with how much tissue they removed as well.

Hopefully the medical community can get a better sense of when it's appropriate to use such technology but it would be a mistake to dismiss the benefits because of misuse by some surgeons.

knz··on Notes on My Colon Cancer
I had a partial nephrectomy several weeks ago due to kidney cancer. You're 100% right about the various feelings that come along with the experience.

Good luck - remember the recurrence rates are comparatively low once you get past a few years.

knz··on Fear and beauty: two weeks living with Covid-19
> the alternative is starvation

Is there not a middle ground of food delivery? Nonperishable foods can sit out for several days before use, significantly reducing the risk.

Likewise with wiping everything down when you get home. Supposedly soap is effective - it's not difficult to soak everything in soapy water. You can't completely eliminate all risk but you can certainly mitigate it.

knz··on The U.S. tried to build a new fleet of ventilators
I assume OP is referring to conditions during a pandemic. There have been numerous reports out of Italy about how they are operating under a wartime triage system - presumably under these conditions the response is more focused on repetition of the same process rather than unique personalised care.
knz··on Your New Medical Credit Score Could Deny You Care
> And if you're a male, you're subsidizing childbirth

Replace "male" with "child free" and this makes sense but suggesting men are subsidizing childbirth is ridiculous.

> and other women specific costs.

https://www.health.harvard.edu/newsletter_article/mars-vs-ve...

> Men die younger than women, and they are more burdened by illness during life. They fall ill at a younger age and have more chronic illnesses than women. For example, men are nearly 10 times more likely to get inguinal hernias than women, and five times more likely to have aortic aneurysms. American men are about four times more likely to be hit by gout; they are more than three times more likely than women to develop kidney stones, to become alcoholics, or to have bladder cancer. And they are about twice as likely to suffer from emphysema or a duodenal ulcer. Although women see doctors more often than men, men cost our society much more for medical care beyond age 65.

knz··on U.S. job openings post biggest drop in more than four years
Why stop at five years? How does this compare to job openings in 1776?

More seriously, bounds have to be set on a comparison like this for it to have relevance.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stock_market_cycles#Short_te... suggests that "Cyclical cycles generally last 4 years, with bull and bear market phases lasting 1–3 years, while Secular cycles last about 30 years with bull and bear market phases lasting 10–20 years."

Assuming this is true or widely accepted by economists, four years seems like an appropriate length of time for a comparison such as this.

knz··on Under digital surveillance: how American schools spy on millions of kids
My kid's elementary school in the US uses their initials and a five digit PIN.

It took about a week for them to learn their PIN (during which time they had a card with the number) when they started school but, several years later, it works fine and doesn't involve exposing their biometric or other PII data.

knz··on TurboTax’s 20-Year Fight to Stop Americans from Filing Taxes for Free
Can we do the same with health insurance premiums? The average cost of an employer plan is up to $20,000+/year in premiums alone but most people are oblivious to the true cost.
knz··on Health Insurance That Doesn’t Cover the Bills Has Flooded the Market
Is the ACA responsible for the rise? Personally, my health insurance rates (for a family plan offered through my employer of ~1,000 people) were increasing by 5-10% per year before the ACA and have been more stable since (3-5% increases per year).

Its currently at a total of $22,000/year (between employer and employee contributions) - that's equivalent to $35,000 dollars in my country of birth (New Zealand), or 700% of what the total tax on the median income is. Somehow, kiwis get all of the functions of government for 14% of what health insurance costs in America. It's insane and reminds me every enrolment season of how poor the ROI on healthcare dollars is in the US.

knz··on In the US, wells being drilled ever deeper as groundwater vanishes
The Great Lakes aren't exactly the same as pristine aquifers suitable for drinking water...

https://www.usgs.gov/news/widespread-plastic-pollution-found..., https://www.safewater.org/fact-sheets-1/2017/1/23/the-great-... etc.

knz··on Ask HN: What do you do with your Raspberry Pi?
Sounds like there is a market for fire standard approved cat doors! ;)

I loved reading what you are doing with the Pi though.

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