wilsonnb2

I think the Tesla fanboys who bought these would have spent $1500 on a coffee mug if Musk had asked them to. Would have had better margins than decorative surfboards but I guess they're optimizing for Twitter appeal instead.

> I said "you're by yourself". Forget the magazines, they are the crappiest magazines ever. The pages are sticky, they are awful.

I assumed you meant "by myself" as in "not with anyone you know". I've actually never sat in a waiting room that was entirely devoid of human life before, but I'm sure it happens in less populated areas.

> Your problem is you never took control of your smartphone.

I don't know where you got this impression. I'm not the person your original comment was responding to - I have a smartphone that I use and like.

> "Sit and think". No, I feel like reading some poetry or philosophy or an interesting article, or listening to music, or playing a puzzle game. I don't want to sit there thinking about the upcoming doctor's appointment.

Those are all valid ways to pass time - so is just sitting and thinking and everything else I said. Being able to do any of those things you listed with the swipe of a finger, even though they are not the usual suspects of Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, and Twitter, is still a form of instant gratification and still has an effect on you. A negative effect, some (myself included) think.

Also, there are plenty of other things to think about aside from the upcoming doctor's appointment.

> They can be set to be just an innocent little screen with interesting words or whatever on it. My own smartphone doesn't annoy me, it does exactly what I want it to do. Zero notifications, internet data is off until I need it etc.

Yes, they can be used like this. I use my own smartphone in a similar manner.

I read something recently (I can't remember what) but it had a quote that I liked.

"You can choose not to use a TV, but you can't choose to live in a world where the TV doesn't exist"

In a similar sense, a person can choose to use a smartphone in a responsible manner or not to use one at all, but they can't choose to live in a culture that wasn't affected by smartphones. They can't choose to live in a world where endless distractions aren't always a few swipes away.

The closest they can get is ditching the smartphone, so that's what they do. It's not just a matter of configuring away the parts of a smartphone you don't like.

So if Google is a monopoly, what should be done about it? Split it up into separate, competing mini-Googles? Keep fining them more and more money until they stop anti-competitive practices? Split off Maps/Android/Drive/etc into separate companies so that Google can't use their search monopoly to dominate those fields?

I'm genuinely not sure what the best way to go about this would be.

I find it rather easy to use android without selling my soul to Google. In fact, I use android on a Google Pixel 2 on Google's own Project Fi network and yet I don't feel as if I've sold my soul to them.

I could switch to an iPhone running iOS on Verizon in the span of a few hours if I felt like it, or just chuck my phone into a river and call it a day. I can install FireFox if I don't want to use Chrome, F Droid if I don't want to use the Play Store, and a huge number of other apps from a huge number of other companies.

The idea that you have to "sell your soul" to Google to use android, even hyperbolically, is stupid.

If banking and internet services are so vital that we justify the existence of libraries because they provide access to them, then the Government should be responsible for providing to it's citizens anyways.

It's possible that libraries are the best way to do that but it's also possible that there are other, better ways.

> Social media apps are easy to uninstall

They're also easy to reinstall, and often times have good enough mobile web clients. Can't uninstall the browser, unfortunately.

It shouldn't surprise us that Twitter/Instagram/Facebook/Reddit are more widely addictive than alcohol. They are designed to be addictive, because it's good for business.

> Just don‘t twitter, instagram, facebook, snapchat or whatever you do 24/7

The point is that choosing to not do these things is hard for a lot of us. Getting rid of a smartphone is a decision you have to make once. Not using Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, Hacker News, and Reddit is a decision that you have to make tens to hundreds of times a day, every day.

Just sit and think. Watch other people. Read the old Vogue magazines. Listen to the conversations between employees. A lot of the time there will be a TV on or some music playing.

It's really not that bad if you're not used to the constant stimulation that smartphones (and to a lesser extent, all internet connected computers) provide.

I use Spotify on multiple devices every day and didn't notice anything about Drake recently, so it must not have been that effective a promotion.

Maybe someday we will all realize that daily fluctuations in a company's market cap don't matter.

Just because something happened doesn't make it news.

Credit cards are an excellent tool as long as you don't accrue debt with them.

I get 1.5%-2% cash back with everything purchased with it. I'd be losing money by using a debit card instead. Not to mention the $500 they gave me just for signing up for it.

I also don't to worry about when I get paid. I might only have $100 left in my checking account when I need to buy groceries if the day I get paid falls at a weird time. I don't have to worry about that sort of thing with a credit card, although it is much less of an issue now that I actually have savings than it was when I was in college.

If someone steals my debit card or my cash and uses it, my money is gone. My bank would probably refund me the stolen money if my debit card was used fraudulently, but until that happens I'm still out however much of my own money.

If they steal my credit card, who cares? I'll call the bank and cancel it and in the mean time, none of my actual money has been touched.

> If I need more I go to the Bank's ATM and get more. Easy.

Not having to go to an ATM is even easier than having to go to an ATM.

There are more people programming for intellectual reasons now than ever before in absolute numbers.

However, that larger absolute number is a much smaller proportion of the total number of programmers than it was in the past.

I think it's also safe to say that the mainstream of programming has moved more towards monetary motivation and away from intellectual curiosity.

But you're the one using these inventions as justification for future space exploration - shouldn't the burden of proof fall on the one making the claim?

> Well, unless we outlaw reproduction without government approval we will hit the limit of what the planet can support as far as human life.

The birth rates of richer nations are significantly lower than the birth rates of poorer nations. I'm not convinced that overpopulation will be an issue as long as we can provide cheap and easy access to birth control to the entire population.

> asteroids contain unfathomable amounts of rare and common elements that will be easy to exploit once the appropriate technologies are developed

This is actually my favorite justification for space exploration, but if this is our goal, we should be focused on asteroid mining and not moon bases or manned mars missions.

> Space exploration will continue to add more and more technological and general scientific breakthroughs

You don't know this. It's just a guess. No one can know if the side effects from space research will prove to be more or less useful than the side effects from cancer research or any other kind of research. It's not something that can be known.

> But you take them for granted and so it is easy for you to make value judgments regarding how money is spent.

It's rude to make such assumptions about me. I do not take the positive side effects from research for granted.

You simply haven't made a case showing why $400B in space research will generate more or better positive side effects than $400B in cancer research.

All research will have side effects that can't be anticipated. It's stupid to perform research with "random, unknowable" side positive side effects as a primary justification.

You can't just point to a list of inventions that came from research in space exploration - you also have to make a case that these inventions would have otherwise not come about, or at least would have come about much later.

It's hard to pinpoint an exact generation where I stop caring. Here's how I like to think of it.

If every human alive today died instantly and painlessly, ending the human species and potentially eliminating all sentient life in the universe, I wouldn't care. The people felt no pain, experienced no dread.

The only reason to care in that instance is if you believe that the human race has inherent value just be being alive. That's what I don't have.

Now, the interaction of this philosophy and the real world isn't always clean but in general, it leads me to prioritize current human life over future human life especially over the long term.

So, for example, a dollar spent feeding a hungry child today takes precedence over a dollar spent exploring the universe even if that exploration lays the groundwork for humans being a multi planetary species 500 years from now.

I hope that clears my position up somewhat.

Because I care to what happens about all living humans today. I simply don't care about the long term survival of our species.

Spreading across the galaxy or the universe so that there can be more humans alive or to ensure that if one planet gets wiped out, some humans live on are placing value on the existence of humans as a species in the universe. That's what I don't care about. I don't think we have intrinsic value that needs to be preserved.

> Getting off this rock is the first step towards getting all of our eggs out of one basket.

Yes it is, but why should I care whether all of our eggs are in one basket, or two baskets, or a million baskets? The survival of the human race as a whole is not a concern of mine.

The real question here is why bother spending 1% of our GDP on space exploration? What tangible benefits is it going to bring, and why are those benefits worth more than the benefit that will come from spending 1% of our GDP on something else?

It's also entirely possible that the cure for all forms of cancer is a diet consisting entirely of frosted flakes, and that spending $400B researching the effects of all-cereal diets would also discover the cure for cancer.

However, it's far more likely that $400B in cancer research will do more for curing cancer than hoping for side effects from $400B in other research.

> why are you skeptics so certain that it's just another fad diet that will come and go?

Because, like most skeptics, we have seen this pattern before. Supposed scientific support and loads of anecdotal evidence are common to all popular fad diets. The scientific support of IF is also much less solid than it's advocates would have you believe.

> IF can actually be a useful enforcement mechanism for the first two parts of "eat food, not too much, mostly vegetables"

I agree with this - so can basically any other fad diet. People that recognize IF as a method of enforcing a basic CICO diet, I agree with. There are plenty of people that, like any other fad diet, think that IF is somehow special in ways unrelated to it's restriction of calories. That's what makes it the same as any other fad diet to me.

> I've actually experienced weight loss, less hunger, better focus, more stable energy levels, lower blood pressure, better sleep

People report this from atkins, vegan, paleo, keto, juice cleanse, weight watchers, south beach, etc. I am happy that you've found a diet that works for you. I hope that everyone finds a healthy diet that works for them.

I just want people to realize that CICO will always be the key to weight loss regardless of how it is achieved, and "eat food. not too much. mostly plants" will (probably) always be the key to a health diet.

Obama's approval rating was above 50% for his last year in office, so I wouldn't say that people were particularly unhappy with him. Honestly, I think he could have won a 3rd term had he been legally allowed to run.

Hillary was unpopular in the voter's eyes for reasons that had little to do with Obama, although their association didn't really help her.

The fact that she was a woman, the fact that she was seen as a member of a political family (despite not coming from a multi-generation political family like the Kennedy or Bush families), the fact that the conservatives of this country had been running propaganda against her for almost 25 years, and the fact that she isn't particularly charismatic all hurt her in the public eye far more than her association with and similarity to Obama.

Which is deeply unfortunate, because none of those things have anything to do with what makes a good President. Perhaps someday we will realize that what makes a good candidate and what makes a good President are not the same.

The authoritative view that Brexit is a bad idea comes from the fact that is was sold almost entirely with lies and xenophobia, and even then barely got a majority.

I would not consider Brexit an authoritatively bad idea if the leave campaign had been more scrupulous and the vote had a larger margin of victory.

"We pay £350 million per week to the EU"

"We will be able to stay in the single market"

"Migrants are overrunning the country"

"We are not a sovereign state as long as we are a member of the EU".

> An important point that I made above is that the time to do something about these issues was in the early 2000s.

You do say that this. But, you also say that liberals "need to start actually giving a damn" about the poor and working class. I am refuting that point by showing that the liberal agenda is actually aimed at helping the middle class and the poor.

> What are the victims of these policies going to do? Nobody listens to them. Nobody cares. So in the end all they're left with is political revolts that most of them from what I've read understand are likely impotent, but at least somebody is discussing it. I'm a coastal "tech elite" and I'm writing this post and I wouldn't be if Hillary had won and Brexit hadn't passed. That's democracy I guess.

The problem with your assessment is not that the Trump situation could have been avoided by changing policy between the early 2000's and the 2016 election. I agree with that.

You assert that nobody is listening to or caring about these people, though, which is what I am refuting. The Democratic party is in favor of helping the poor and the middle class, and it has been for a long time.

> Obama sort of noticed and walked up and peed on it. The pee sizzled and steamed for a second and the flames shot higher.

Obama could have (and would have) done a lot more than "pee" on the flames, as you put it, had he not had to contend with an obstructionist Congress. There is only so much blame you can put on any President due to the limitations on their powers, and very little blame that can be put on Obama in my opinion.

> If liberals want to do anything about it they need to start actually giving a damn about America's poor and rapidly shrinking middle class in spite of the fact that they hold "backward and primitive" religious beliefs and are behind the times on social issues.

Hillary focused so much on the shrinking middle class and the poor during the 2016 election - I can't believe that anyone who has actually read her policy suggestions (or the policy suggestions of most other Democrats) can say that liberals don't give a damn about America's poor and shrinking middle class with a straight face.

Here's a selection of Hillary Clinton's policy positions from the 2016 election that would help the poor or the shrinking middle class. I understand that most of them aren't actual policy - however, if you go to the website where I pulled this from [1] you can find information about specific policy as well. I just went for the quotes here to make my point while keeping the comment brief.

> "Provide tax relief to working families from the rising costs they face"

> "Simplify and cut taxes for small businesses so they can hire and grow."

> "Make debt free college available to all Americans."

> "Hillary Clinton has announced a $275 billion, five-year plan to rebuild our infrastructure—and put Americans to work in the process."

> "Bring down out-of-pocket costs like copays and deductibles"

> "Reduce the cost of prescription drugs."

> "Fight for health insurance for the lowest-income Americans in every state by incentivizing states to expand Medicaid"

> "Expand access to rural Americans, who often have difficulty finding quality, affordable health care"

> "Remove barriers to sustainable homeownership."

> "Help responsible homeowners save for a down payment."

> "Defend the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau"

> "Strengthen American manufacturing with a $10 billion “Make it in America” plan."

> "Restore collective bargaining rights for unions and defend against partisan attacks on workers’ rights."

> "calling for a tax credit for businesses that hire apprentices, providing much needed on-the-job training—especially for young Americans."

[1] https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/

Nobody should trust the will of the people. That's why we have representative democracies and not direct democracies.

The Brexit referendum shouldn't get a special "do-over". Instead, the result should be ignored because leaving the EU is a bad idea regardless of the people's will.

I'm sure a majority of the people have many other terrible ideas that they agree with, especially when you only need 51% of those who care enough to vote to constitute a "majority".

Trusting the will of the people is the philosophy of a lynch mob, not a government.

I'd be curious to know why the many online advocates of intermittent fasting (and other time restricted diets) think it's any different than the many other fad diets that have come, gone, and come again.

Diets in general seem to bring out the obsessive optimization that many (especially on this website) are prone too and the "one quick trick" mentality.

I'll be surprised if there is ever any better advice than "eat food. not too much. mostly plants".

And I long for the day when fan-boys in both camps can admit that all current phones are actually quite good. If smartphone development stopped here and we never got a new smartphone, I don't think it would matter much overall.

It probably could have stopped a few years ago, actually. Perhaps in the iPhone 6/Galaxy S6 generation.