Hero.

Don is an addict. No matter how much money, women or success he gets, it will never be enough. He’ll chase that next high to the end of the earth.

The solar panel technology has evolved in leaps and bounds in the past 20 years. Current panels are more efficient and resilient than old ones. I’d recommend saving for a new installation if you can.

In some places you can get a loan against your house equity for things like a solar panel installation if you install it on the roof. The thinking there bejng that the value of the house increases as a result. There may also be subsidies you can access.

That being said, you can test an used solar panel with a decent multimeter, by measuring the voltage (DC volts), short circuit current (DC ampers) and operating current if you can (this one is easier with a clamp meter, but you have to measure it on a live installation). As long as the values are reasonably close to the panel spec, you should be fine. There are tutorials out there on how to actually do it without blowing the fuse on your tools.

They: “I don’t even.”

You:“… lift, bro?”

I should care less.

Perfect human beings don’t exist. Apparently there’s a religion positing there was one perfect human, but we nailed him to a cross for interfering with business.

Here’s a thought. If you were able to get away with Almost Anything ™ and were surrounded by people praising your genius, dashing good looks and boundless generosity towards their persons, how long would it take for you to lose your moral compass, you think? You would pretty soon lose your frame of reference to the normal people, and your empathy would follow. And that’s assuming you’re not 2nd or 3rd generation ultra rich, in which case you never had it to begin with.

Succession is a very good TV series exploring the mindset of such people, if you want to see it in action. Otherwise, history is full of examples - such as Nero, the greatest poet to ever set fire to Rome.

I know there are exceptions, like everywhere else in life. But those tend to cultivate humility as a habit, like other people go to the gym.

Old Man’s War by John Scalzi was made for this, I swear. His latest books also read a lot like movie scripts are contained therein.

Charles Stross’ Laundry series has a ton of potential too, if less Chtullu is required, I wouldn’t mind a Merchant Princes series either.

I heard rumours about Forever War being optioned at some point, but nothing came of it.

Thanks for the reality check. Still a huge result if it translates well into mass production.

Yes, and if 30 people can sing a symphony in 2 hours, imagine what 120 people could do.

Hours spent working is not the same as productivity.

Twice as many people assigned to a project does not double productivity either.

I could go on…

Don King had an alternative thesis:

https://youtu.be/o4qo161MRNE?feature=shared

You should probably do it twice, before and after. Just to be on the safe side.

Nevermind hackers. Look up “corporation in the middle” attacks, which is a prime example of subverting secure channels at scale.

If you don’t own the hardware, nothing you do on it is truly private. Ditto if someone else has admin access to your hardware (eg BYOD scenarios) . Inserting a root certificate into the OS is trivial in both cases.

The right to bear men.

Yeah, it was ragebait alright. Then again, if it were phrased in a reasonable manner, would we be talking this much about it? If the objective was to kick-start a conversation, it did the job 110%

Harassment should not be tolerated, period. Totally with you on this.

And thank you for the kind words.

Here’s my take: the bear thing is causing such a visceral reaction that it is very hard to take a step back, not take it personally and have a rational discussion about it. Even if you know the statistics. Even if you’re absolutely certain you’d do the right thing (or maybe especially then).

I was exposed to a somewhat similar experience in college: while walking through the campus one evening I realised the girl in front of me was a good friend of mine, so I rushed to catch up. When she heard me she quickened her pace close to running, and only stopped when I said her name and something like “wait up!”. I was just happy to meet a friend. She, on the other hand, was absolutely terrified, and told me all about it as we walked towards the exit.

That evening I realised that women experience the world much different than men. That there’s an underlying level of potential violence that they evaluate and weigh against potential benefits from encounters and interactions with men in almost all social contexts. And knowing that has recalibrated my behaviour to a certain extent, as I realised women can’t afford to give me the benefit of the doubt, especially in contexts where they feel vulnerable.

I wish more men would get this point, especially in their formative years. It’s not a judgement on their character when women that barely know them are careful around them. Trust needs to be earned. And for a woman, the cost of misplaced trust is too damn high.

FDA vs. Alliance for Hypocritic Medicine.

I was thinking about the future. Think of a cornered Hitler with access to hydrogen bombs.

Wow that’s even scarier than what I had in mind. Good intentions all the way down.

The fucked up thing about humanity is that we invented our own destruction, put a shiny red button on top and wrote on it “do not touch”. As if there would ever be a scenario where pressing it would make sense. And seeing the rethoric coming out of Russia these days, I can’t help but wonder. Damn, I guess this is what my parents lived with at the height of the Cold War?

Iain M. Banks’ “Culture” series. RIP