CannonFodder
@CannonFodder@lemmy.world
- Comment on Our understanding of reality might be a result of the way cousciousness works 11 hours ago:
They didn’t do surveys like that back when they didn’t have soap, so we can never know. But I think healthier longevity is pretty clearly a plus. But you do you - you can refuse heath care if you think it will make you happier.
- Comment on Our understanding of reality might be a result of the way cousciousness works 17 hours ago:
I would say even animals have some modeling of the world around them. Like a cat knows if it pushes something off a counter, it will bang on the floor.
And more academic modeling has certainly improved lives with much less food scarcity throughout the world, and much improved healthcare. Your cellphone may not actually make your life better, but having your cancer detected and treated early certainly can. - Comment on Our understanding of reality might be a result of the way cousciousness works 1 day ago:
You can survive. From knowing that eating alleviates hunger, to knowing what to say to get an idea across, to designing new high tech that improves the quality of lives. It all requires that we model reality in some form.
- Comment on Our understanding of reality might be a result of the way cousciousness works 1 day ago:
Again, to understand our observable reality and make predictions.
- Comment on Rent is theft 1 day ago:
I think you underestimate the effort / work being a landlord. I’m not a landlord myself, but I own my own house and I know how much effort it takes to do upkeep or even to manage others to do the work.
Yes, people usually want to make the most money. And if we shift to government ‘free’ mortgages for everyone to build (or hire people to build) their own homes, then there will be many people who take advantage of that situation too. Either way, regulation is needed to keep the system on track.
The capitalist system encourages people to invest in other people’s housing - this is not an inherently bad thing. It can find efficiencies that governments never would. Housing is special because everyone needs it, so regulations are needed to ensure the market force efficiencies work for the benifit of the population in general. Government should provide for a baseline housing for all, if not for moral grounds, simply because it’s cheaper than dealing with the costs of an unhoused population. However once we get to the next level up of housing comfort that people reasonably desire, a market economy can work well if properly regulated. As they say, from a pragmatic point of view, capitalism is the worst system except for all the others.
- Comment on Our understanding of reality might be a result of the way cousciousness works 1 day ago:
I think maybe you misunderstand what a model is in this context. It’s any way of mapping observations to a theory of how things work. I would say a good model is one that can create useful testable predictions. This tests the accuracy of the model, and it also provides for innovation. You can have a model based on a random sky fairy magically doing stuff and writing a book about it. But that model is untestable, and useless.
- Comment on Rent is theft 1 day ago:
Do you know the difference between profit and income for a personal landlord? Effectively not much. It’s not just an investment for them, it’s a good chunk of their job and their income. Often they are paying the mortgage with income from another job too.
They can rent their property at a rent lower than upkeep because they are gaining capital that they can eventually sell.
Larger landlords can even do better due to the economy of scale for upkeep costs.
Unfortunately, landlords will often try to make the most and so maximize rent based on the market. The market should balance this out (ie if being a landlord is so lucrative, more people should become landlords and that would increase the competition and costs would go down). But many people don’t want to figure out all the details, borrow large sums of money, take on the risk, take on the stress of managing tenants, etc. - which just shows the value added by the landlord is real. Of course without enough regulations, things can go wonky - like our current system with large corporate landlords. I’m not saying that’s good. Just that the basic landlord concept isn’t inherently flawed. - Comment on Rent is theft 2 days ago:
If a co-op takes the loan, aren’t they just becoming a landlord? And who does the work to organize it - are they paid? Isn’t that just like a landlord taking profit?
If you look at the government as just a collective of the people, then there’s no magical entity ‘eating the risk’ - it just means the people get screwed over and/or someone doesn’t get paid for their work.
Yes, you can use a handyman to fix your roof, but you have to pay them. And if you can’t afford to, you what - take more loan from the government which endlessly prints money? - Comment on Our understanding of reality might be a result of the way cousciousness works 2 days ago:
A model is an understanding of how it works. It allows one to predict how things might react in different general cases, which can be very useful for innovation. You don’t need to try understand things if you don’t want to, but it’s a bit ignorant sounding.
- Comment on Rent is theft 2 days ago:
Who takes out this loan? The person who wants to live in the home? What if they can’t afford to pay it back? Isn’t paying interest on the loan the same as paying rent, except now you’re stuck without being able to move, and no one else is there to fix your roof when it needs it?
- Comment on Rent is theft 2 days ago:
Who pays the upfront costs? Big taxes?
- Comment on Rent is theft 2 days ago:
Who’s the worthless parasite? The person who feels they shouldn’t have to work and pay for their shelter?
- Comment on Rent is theft 2 days ago:
How to ‘fix’ that? Someone has to do the work to build and maintain housing? Should they do it for free?
- Comment on Our understanding of reality might be a result of the way cousciousness works 3 days ago:
Science can’t prove anything. It seeks to build comprehensive models that agree with observations by disproving those that don’t. It is specifically built in a way that uses predictions based on theory and then tests them. This process is used to avoid making useless and unknowable additions. That, and its inherent nature to question everything, is what makes it fundamentally different from religeon. However, it is based on an assumption that the universe makes sense as a physical construct. And that is because there is no other useful starting point. You can try to build a model of the universe based on any gibberish of feelings, but it isn’t useful in any way.
- Comment on Our understanding of reality might be a result of the way cousciousness works 4 days ago:
We don’t have proof that consciousness is the result of a physical process. But there’s no reason to think it isn’t. You can make up anything and say it’s unknowable, and nobody can prove this false; but it’s pretty much useless. Sure you can stick with ‘I think therefore I am’ as the only knowable thing, but it won’t get you very far. The physical world as science has self-consistently explained has been shown to be very practical, specifically with prediction of observation. Consciousness seems different, but there’s no real reason to assume it is.
- Comment on Hiroshima scientists turn any smartphone into a radiation detector 5 days ago:
Yes, but a cheap Geiger counter doesn’t use AI. Get with the times.
- Comment on xkcd: Chemical Formula 1 week ago:
Pretty accurate, but misses some of the structure.
^(not an astrophisiolologist but I play one on the internet) - Comment on 1 week ago:
ok
- Comment on Denominator, go Mercator 1 week ago:
Acquiring Greenland would move the USA up 2 places in the list of largest countries (past Canada and China). That’s probably why he wants it.
- Comment on Hubble uncovers the secret of stars that defy ageing 2 weeks ago:
More like living in a less crowded area, and, er, a binary lifestyle.
- Comment on With all this talk about Ai not being profitable why aren't we using it in video games? I dont mean replacing developers I mean in NPCs in the game. I make them more realistic. 2 weeks ago:
Ah, but then you get to stab the Nazi in the head.
- Comment on A new cooling technology freezes food without warming the climate 2 weeks ago:
Agreed. But you can cool without heating the planet. It doesn’t violate the laws of thermodynamics because it just uses a larger system - I.e. nocturnal radiative cooling.
- Comment on The holy journey 2 weeks ago:
I have no knowledge either way. But what if he’s right and you’ve been wasting half your lsd by swallowing? That would be very sad. Have you tried sticking it in the roof of your mouth, or whatever he’s suggesting?
- Comment on In just 15 years, the average U.S. homebuyer went from 39 to 59 years old: Top analyst reveals how the housing market has warped in one generation 3 weeks ago:
Or did the grandparents just decide to spend their own money on their retirement and not give it to their entitled children?
- Comment on YSK a US passport card costs $30 and is definitive proof of citizenship. It fits in your wallet like a credit card. 3 weeks ago:
Because it’s giving in to fascism. It’s going along with it and accepting that in the U.S. you have to carry ‘papers’. It shouldn’t be about looking after your own personal best interests, it should be about fighting back to reclaim the country from fascism.
- Comment on Annual merit increase 3 weeks ago:
If you can make more elsewhere then switch jobs. Companies have no loyalty to you, so you shouldn’t have any to them. It’s all financial, so do the best you can for yourself. Companies count on you not wanting to change jobs - don’t play their game.
- Comment on Greenland says it cannot accept US takeover ‘under any circumstances’ 3 weeks ago:
Time to give Greenland nukes.
- Comment on [meme] choochoo 3 weeks ago:
Sorry, best we can do in the U.S. is fuck all.
- Comment on Circumcision classed as possible child abuse in draft CPS document 3 weeks ago:
Shouldn’t cut the umbilical cord either without consent from the baby.
- Comment on Circumcision classed as possible child abuse in draft CPS document 3 weeks ago:
Didn’t work on me.