nautilius

How fast we went from "Best and unique in the world" to "let's not pretend it's as bad as in many other countries" ...

You do get jailed, though, for talking to the authorities in a way they don't like.

https://www.npr.org/2022/09/06/1121322520/a-black-protester-...

I’m sure you mean freedom of expression unless the authorities disapprove?

https://www.npr.org/2022/09/06/1121322520/a-black-protester-...

Biggest source of conflict I've seen is when an American who thinks they're direct meets someone who actually is.

Do you have some resources about recycling of panels? I understand the point of the article is it's no longer the pressing issue it was once considered (by some), but I am curious if it's now just a delayed problem, or if recycling is a solved problem? Thanks!

Wealth distribution in particular can be accurately modeled by purely random coin flips on who gets more and who loses: E.g. https://chancyislands.org/CIChance.html

Absolutely no meritocracy required.

Guess the downvote means 'no'.

Care to elaborate what those would be?

It’s not misrepresentative. The sonic boom is the coalescence of the pressure perturbations caused by the moving aircraft into an N shaped wave. When that coalescence can be delayed or prevented, there is no sonic boom to be perceived by people on the ground. The amplitude of the pressure pulse is much less relevant than the time over which that pressure peak is reached. When that time is stretched, there is no boom. That’s what the research discussed here is going for.

I don’t think you understand what a thought experiment is and that explains your confusion in this thread.

All conclusions drawn from “imagine shining a flashlight on a train riding close to the speed of light” revolutionized physics, so the answer is a very clear YES.

So why do you think Obama does not have a right to free speech?

We all know that the number of AR-15 your credit card company lets you buy is the only proper way to count ‘freedom points’ (TM).

Crippling debt from education so that you have some shot at a career, or a health insurance system that has successfully abolished any market mechanisms and effectively ties you to your employers certainly don’t contribute to any ‘mass control’ whatsoever.

I called out the euphemism that hid an atrocity - not clear where you think I am doing that here?

Scary, how people argue that war is naturally a much more controlled environment than police action on citizens exercising their rights.

Ooh, nice! "Targeting industrial workers to target the war making capacity" sounds so much nicer than "indiscriminate mass killing of civilians".

Don't get me wrong, the Germans had it coming, but let's stop lying to ourselves, shall we?

> You can travel all across the US and it's exactly like travelling across Europe given the diversity.

Yeah, no further questions. Have you ever left the US?

> one with literally several or many times more people than name a European country.

I didn't know non-puritanism scales with size! TIL!

> Pretty much everything you listed is a norm

Yes, that's exactly what I wrote. Seems you agree after all!

So, if I am just cherrypicking, where is the majority of states with uncensored radio and music? Where do you see nipples on magazines in supermarkets? Where can you say "shit", "piss", "fuck", "cunt", "cocksucker", "motherfucker", and "tits" on TV and in movies without repercussion? In which states can you bathe nude or even just topless? Or just even change on the beach? Where can I consume alcohol in public as a norm, without brown bag? Where can I simply drink in a car, as long as I am not driving, or, as a driver, not exceeding the legal alcohol limit?

> many of whom might make a Roman at their peak blush.

Man, that made me laugh out loud.

Imagine observing American media, from nipplegate, to nipple-censoring, to Carlin's seven words, to censored and sanitized song lyrics in the radio and in the store, to warning labels about 'explicit lyrics', to hyperclean and sanitized Hollowood movie productions, to covered and hidden magazine covers - and still thinking the Americans, as a general default, are not puritanical. Thank you for that.

Hardly, unless the Wrights also inspired development of the Time Machine that allowed Prandtl to found the first aerodynamics research lab in 1904, or Lilienthal’s studies on the aerodynamics of stork wings, that he used to build and fly his own heavier-than-air gliders with, which the Wrights heavily relied on.

Many countries (UK, Brazil, France, etc) had similar local flying heroes that inspired advances in those countries. Your view is simply US-biased.

You should try to read and understand posts before you try to pull out your own "pseudo-intelligence". Nowhere have I written "America is backwards".

You're using 'how we arrived here' as a cheap excuse of an excuse to justify a status quo that is worse than it is in other places. That's the trope of American exceptionalism right there, to somehow find consolation in 3rd world conditions through repeated 'but we are god's own country, screw that even China has a higher life expectancy'. Really, the trope here is how the proud patriots of the richest, most powerful country in the world simultaneously feel superior to everyone, yet feel butthurt and threatened by essentially anything else on this planet that doesn't exactly act/think/look like they do.

> Sure we could have a German tax system for the simplest filers. We got to the 1040EZ because we believe in theory governments should stay out of our business.

That makes no sense whatsoever. As you write yourself, 1040EZ simply lets you confirm what the government already knows. The difference to the German system is that you still have to jump through hoops, roll over, and catch the ball when the government tells you to. I guess you also see the 'Obey the speed limit' signs in Texas as manifestation of supreme liberty, contrasted to the oppressive German 'no speed limit'.

Most other Western countries have much more powerful (= effective) checks and balances, as should have become exceedingly clear by the failure of the American system to keep an even openly criminal President and his attempted coup in check. That game is still not over. Most of Europe learnt that lesson by studying what went wrong in Germany 90 years ago.

But, I mean, you do you.

>Obviously.

Apparently not, as you insist on only a single value in your own post.

> The number I suggested is 1) an upper limit not a lower limit

How is that related to anything? Did you consider going even faster in rain and snow?

I didn't say that at all. I said they evolved to their current form, which we happen to enjoy.

> "did they appreciate things purely for aesthetics and cultural relevance, and not utility?"

Many animals do, even sharing their sense of aesthetics with human taste. Just look at how flowers evolved to some form even we find pleasing without any skin in the game, or how animals that live in total dark (deep sea, for example) are atrociously ugly.

The speed limit is absolutely not the right single value in heavy rain / fog / snow / etc.

The speed limit is also not the single correct value in case of some freak occurrence where it's better for everyone involved to exceed the limit briefly to avoid collision.

Not tiring at all, when it's not a trope. This forum contains a surprising number of posts of sometimes ridiculously blind US-praising that is rooted in simple ignorance of how things run elsewhere and in the US.

Concerning taxes though, I'll have to (quasi) side with you. 1040EZ is as easy as it gets. One could of course argue that in that case, in which the IRS has the numbers already, why do you have to be forced to do your taxes at all (think Germany).

No. It just means that the prevalent drivel in this discussion about how much better it is in the US vs UK concerning ‘what are you allowed to say so the government isn’t mad’ is moot. I’d wager that those arrested in the UK won’t even see a judge but will be released right after, unlike in the ‘free’ US where what you say to a cop will be fully persecuted and lead to actual jail time of several years, for saying words to a government representative.

Haha, because the referenced 'right to free speech' has clearly no connection to the U.S.?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man