No, this isn't a well-functioning capitalist system. Competition is a core principle of capitalism. What occurred in the aerospace industry represents a government-sanctioned monopoly.
It’s always so funny to read this kind of answer when someone points out the evident flaws of capitalism!
“Hey, wait a minute, this is not how capitalism is supposed to work, so you can’t say it’s capitalism”.
Too bad that capitalism isn’t one monolithic thing and this is ABSOLUTELY how loosely regulated American capitalism works.
It’s a form of capitalism where human life is an optimization problem that sits on the way to profits.
Is there any kind of alternative that could be found, or have we reached the end of history, with our only two options being 2023 capitalism versus 1960s Soviet state capitalism?
I'm less concerned about mistakes as I am about systemic failures and bad incentives.
Boeing seems to have created a political and regulatory environment for itself where its better for it to design and build planes poorly, than it is for it to design and build planes well.
Consider the incentives of the people at the FAA. Their incentive is to never approve a design, because if they approve a faulty design, they get the heat, too. It's much safer to just not approve anything, or at least delay demanding ever more documentation.
Hence there's always going to be a tug of war between the FAA and the industry. The FAA never wants to approve anything, and industry goes out of business if the FAA doesn't approve it.
You'll see the same forces in action with the FDA.
BTW, as is abundantly clear from history, a fatal design mistake can and has destroyed several airframe companies. Boeing's finances were punished severely after the MAX crashes. Boeing does not win by making an unsafe design. When I worked at Boeing, I didn't know any engineer who was willing to sign his name to a faulty design. Yes, the engineer responsible for a piece of work gets his name on the drawings. It's career suicide for him if he signed off on a bad design.
Capitalism is literally defined by the ability to invest capital to accumulate more of it by way of profit. The logical end of this process is straightforwardly monopoly.
And if the world/environment/context of the business didn’t change then the monopolies might last, but because there is change there is room to innovate and outcompete the monopolies.
Capitalism is not only defined by the accumulation of capital, but also by competition. The interplay between market forces, competition, innovation, and regulation in capitalism works against the formation of monopolies.
The aerospace industry is not a good example of capitalism. What we have with Boeing is basically a government sanctioned monopoly. It’s basically a weak form of nationalization, without the stigma.
>Capitalism is not only defined by the accumulation of capital, but also by competition
That's wrong. In reality, the mere theoretical potential for competition has always been more than enough to call it capitalism from any perspective. The facts are that actual competition is not a requirement.
Capitalism is simple: The capital rules supreme. As opposed to the previous system of aristocracy, where it was the land owners. Nobody would seriously claim that aristocracy requires any kind of competition between the aristocrats. Even the very first capitalist big enterprises, such as East India Company were created as _monopolies_
Monopolies are broken by capitalism just as much as they're created by capitalism. The whole "end-stage capitalism" schtick is wrong because a free market will lead to the ossification and then breakdown of a monopolist. You just have to finish spring semester of Econ101 to find out how.
In it's origins it was about the capital ruling, as opposed to the aristocracy. So political power would be in the hands of people with capital, not the landed aristocracy. The means of production only entered the equation with the industrial revolution. And capitalism is older than that, albeit not much older
Abortion is a complex and controversial issue. Google does not have an obligation to only show pro-choice material when searching abortion, because that would be a form of censorship and bias that would violate its own principles of neutrality and diversity. I am not persuaded by your argument that these search results will harm users.
Google does not have an obligation to only show pro-choice material when searching abortion
Your twisted words here aren't helping your argument. In this situation someone is looking for healthcare options and they are being shown options for scam services that have no intention to ever provide any healthcare.
Just as if someone was searching for prescription medication and it directed them to sites that sold what appeared to be medication and instead were just sugar pills made to look like real medication.
Boy, talk about the pot calling the kettle black. You twisting the definition of "healthcare" to only mean abortion is just as bad. "Healthcare" to a teen on the fence might mean EXACTLY looking for an agency that can help them deliver and give the baby up for adoption.
Nice attempt at intimidation - and I hope you enjoyed scrolling through years of my comments hoping to find something to sling since you can't address my actual arguments - but there's a reason people don't use alt accounts when voicing their support for abortion rights, because, again, the overwhelming majority of people are in favor of them.
"Healthcare" to a teen on the fence might mean EXACTLY looking for an agency that can help them deliver and give the baby up for adoption.
Are you arguing that clinics don't provide services that help women deliver babies or guide them through adoption? That's ridiculous. My two children are proof that doctors aren't going around fighting against women giving birth.
Are you arguing that search results for "how do I put my baby up for adoption" should lead to "abortion" clinics getting the top results, purely from either an English-language or PageRank metrics point of view?
I am pretty sure there would be a fair bit of outrage if woman searching for prenatal adoption services were directed to abortion clinics adverting as prenatal adoption centers that then stear people towards the "options" of abortion.
The main point is false representation; which Google if they value their relationship with their users .. they do have an obligation to carry advertising towards some degree of truth in representation of product or service being offered.
> I am pretty sure there would be a fair bit of outrage if woman searching for prenatal adoption services were directed to abortion clinics adverting as prenatal adoption centers that then stear people towards the "options" of abortion.
Well yes, because you're supposed to steer people away from killing, not towards it. After all, it's a good thing for searches about suicide to return results about treating depression, but it'd be horrible if searches about treating depression returned results about how to commit suicide.
> The main point is false representation; which Google if they value their relationship with their users .. they do have an obligation to carry advertising towards some degree of truth in representation of product or service being offered.
Continuing with my above example, is it false representation for Google to give you anti-suicide results for searches about suicide? Should they have to be truthful by only giving you results with instructions?
Your writing the words down does not make it so. It isn't particularly complex, and it isn't particularly controversial in the United States, even among Republicans; people want abortion rights and fringe groups want to deprive them of it.
Edit: also, I can't believe you baited me into arguing about whether abortion should be allowed or not.
Just in case you aren't actually familiar with these "crisis pregnancy centers" and how they work, this is about physical buildings that literally masquerade as abortion centers who are ready to help people get their needed abortions, and instead string them along until it's legally or medically too late.
Of course people who believe abortion is problematic should be allowed to freely say so. That is not the activity that these frauds are engaged in.
I’d hardly call extremist right-wing Christians a ‘fringe group’, as much as I think most people wish they were...
‘Terrorist group’? Sure. Spot on. ‘Fringe’? Sadly not at all.
Look at the ongoing trans genocide as another example as to how big and how powerful these truly hate-filled people are.
EDIT: saw a disgusting uneducated dead comment below here saying it’s offensive to call the very real trans genocide a ‘genocide’ to others because I guess they’ve either done no research or are more likely just transphobic.
It’s sad to see even in usually amazing communities like this; that the denial of the trans genocide continues.
We can’t begin to fix a problem, before we acknowledge the problem exists, and this isn’t a deniable or debatable issue - it’s happening. Let’s not be ignorant hateful cretins by denying it. Please.
Abortion is a complex and controversial issue for one religion and one political party. If every religion or political party’s “complexities” need to affect MY google searches at that point it will likely need to look like some castrated caricature of a page trying to answer the actual question I asked.
That's how human rights get violated and start getting worse for the people who are impacted, by calling it "controversial", wanting to be "neutral". It's typically people who have no skin in the game that call it that way and will never lose anything by debating it.
NPR's funding does not come solely from direct appropriation. NPR receives a higher amount of federal funding than what is commonly believed. It is difficult to determine the exact amount of federal funding because it is hidden within the fees paid by local affiliates. These local affiliates receive a significant portion of their funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which is itself funded by federal tax dollars.
Congressional appropriation > Corporation for Public Broadcasting > grants for local affiliates > fee paid to NPR
Everything is turned into an existential risk these days. People are prone to believe in apocalyptic predictions because they fear the unknown and rely on flawed mental heuristics. Apocalyptic predictions automatically illicit skepticism from me.
Yes, this is how I feel about it. Between climate change, obesity, GM foods, mega-viruses, insects dying, extreme solar flares, and now AI, I’m surprised I’m still here anyway. Just perhaps AI will actually help solve some of those problems.
Counterpoint: the more our capacity grows, the more we have the legitimate ability to bring absolute destruction
Plastic or some other chemical ending sperm counts —> we previously had no ability to affect the global ecosystem on this scale
Bioweapon virus or microorganism eviscerating civilization —> we had no prior ability to engineer such a plague
Nuclear holocaust —> we previously had no ability to destroy the world with weapons
Runaway climate change —> we previously had no ability to alter the climate
Ai sky net moment —> we previously had no ability to make such an intelligence
Solar flare cutting all electronics —> we previously had no dependence upon a single point of failure
I could go on. We’ve had plenty of civilizations collapse but nothing has been so linked before and we lacked such capacity before.
This is not to say any of the above will come to pass. But it is foolish to say “apocalypses were previously impossible hence such warnings can be dismissed out of hand”
I'm spitballing here but it could be an opportunity for another bank to expand into a new market and acquire new customers. SVB has a unique position in the market, as they specialize in catering to the financial needs of industries such as technology, life science, healthcare, private equity, and venture capital.
Spot on, a ton of Directors / MDs are rushing to push this in front of their leadership (whoever 'leads' the acquisition will no doubt burnish their personal brand / career path /s).
That said, if I'm an SVB customer...do I want to stick with the bank that's had this issue? Even so, would I want to bank with the acquirer?
Seems like much of the SVB customer base doesn't have a/much choice with who will provide banking for them at the early stage.
Seems like the reason for acquiring this risking market would be to transition your the clients who succeed into the parent bank for their future banking needs. Sure you will get a bunch of small/medium sized clients for a mega bank, but they are just fishing for a couple giant paydays and want the next Apple or Amazon to start banking with them.
these specialist banks are not worth much, there is no retail banking advantage to having tech companies as clients. the individual people who run the companies are most likely already wealth management clients of the same banks that might acquire SVB.
In my metro, the median listing price for a home just peaked. Driven by low supply, high demand - stemming from a variety of factors. I've made competitive offers on many homes, only to be beaten by all cash offers or people putting more cash down for an appraisal gap. I get angry when I think about neighboring properties that sold for 50% less only 3 years ago, financed at 2.5% interest rates - while I must make a decision to pay 50% more and pay 7%. My wage increases during this time do not fill the gap. I feel I must accept a lower standard of living than my neighbor. This is a massive source of inequality that I feel does not get enough attention. I am quietly feeling the stress of despair and fomo in regards to my housing situation. How can a society function like this?
Even on a software eng salary in Seattle area, housing 40m away from city took many many years of saving to afford downpayment. As we were saving, the price went up faster than we could meet 20%. The rents also went up. It feel like the bar kept on moving faster than we could catch up.
This was 5 years ago. At current >1M prices, that would not be possible. 2 bedroom rents in Bellevue are > $2500/month. Kind of nuts.
The separation of church and state is not about preventing any kind of relationship between religious institutions and the government. Rather, it is about ensuring that the government does not establish an official state religion, and that it remains neutral towards different religious beliefs and practices.
This - but one could argue that the state having to make determinations of what constitutes a religious belief and practice _could_ go against the separation of church and state.
The state's role in determining whether a religious organization qualifies for tax-exempt status is not to evaluate the content or validity of the organization's religious beliefs or practices. The state's role is to ensure that the organization meets certain objective criteria for tax-exempt status, a necessary function.
You sure can if you follow the IRS's strict rules and requirements for granting tax-exempt status to religious organizations. I suspect you would have difficulty in demonstrating that the organization has a legitimate religious purpose and is organized and operated exclusively for that purpose. Creating a fake religion is likely to be viewed as fraud and could result in legal consequences.
It is not a waste. These halo products help drive performance and efficiency improvements to mainstream products. With every generation, CPUs become more efficient when looking at performance per watt. Intel and AMD CPU's are more efficient than ever.
Sort of but also not really: performance per watt is not the complete measure of improvement, you need to look at "performance, per watt, per wasted watt": If your high performance CPU uses 75W just to stay powered on, then its almost certainly not an improvement over a slower CPU that burns through less energy just to power the cores at all.
For example, let's contrast the 13700k to the ancient 7920X. The 13700K benchmarks to 47106, with a TDP of 250, a performance per watt of 188. Compare that to a 7920X, which benchmarks to half that at 23607, with a TDP of 140W, a performance per watt that's less than 170. The 13700K is clearly an improvement if we stopped there!
Except we don't, because the wasted watts matter a lot: the 13700K needs 75W just to power its cores, whereas the 7920X needs 50W. Adjusting our performance per watt to performance per watt per wasted watt, we get 2.5 for the 13700K, but 3.4 for the 7920X. That old CPU is a lot better at turning energy into work.
The 13700K is unquestionably a higher performing CPU than the 7920X, and I doubt anyone would object to calling it a much, much better CPU, but it's very hard to--with a straight face--call the newer CPUs an improvement in terms of energy consumption. CPUs have gotten quite a bit worse =)
If you take it to an extreme the flaw is apparent. Let's say "bogomips" is the name of a real world accurate benchmark.
If a CPU at full performance gives 100 bogomips at 2 watts and idles at 1 watt by your metric the score is 50.
On the other hand, if a CPU at full performance gives 200 bogomips at 2 watts and idles at a small fraction under 2 watts, your metric also gives a score of ~50.
It's obvious the 200 bogomips processor is way more efficient than the 100 bogomips processor. Something is missing.
I think both idle watts and TDP are somewhat irrelevant. Maybe it should be bogomips / actual watt draw (different from nominal TDP) at full speed. Assuming you can keep the processor busy. Not being able to keep the processor busy doesn't really reflect on processing efficiency. Except that it is better for the wasted watts to be as low as possible.
A true efficiency, like a true benchmark is elusive, because what is "normal use"? Somewhere between "no work, all waste" and "full use, maximum efficiency".
I do this in effect. For things that don't rely on high core counts and memory bandwidth, advanced CPU or GPU features, or complex environments, I use a $150 Chromebook.
These new Intels are desktop CPUs.
They also have Performance and Efficiency cores. Ideally, they'd prioritize using E-cores, and only as many as needed to complete tasks within an acceptable period. In effect, though, they're not very smart, and you've got to get into overclocking and undervolting to get them into a state that resembles AMD's TDP-limited ECO Mode that provides 80% of the performance at 50% of the power.
This crusade against gas stoves is fascinating to watch. I believe we are observing the pattern for how "science" is used to manipulate populations. This effort has all the hallmarks of a disinformation campaign. Sudden emergence, weak or falsified evidence, an engineered emergency, using children to emotionally manipulate, politicians signally adherence, extreme calls to action, etc.
It's an interesting phenomenon; at its core is the "correct" idea that gas stoves aren't the most efficient and lead to indoor pollution but it is such a negligible problem that the effort put into legislation against it seems like a giant waste of time an resources.
I feel like most people are in the camp of, "Who cares? Is this really something we're worried about?" At least I am in that camp but there's also likely a term for ignoring the small problems because of the big problems.
I’ve felt this way too. Suddenly this massive propaganda campaign has sprung up on the left to demonize gas stoves. Comment threads including this one are packed with lies about how electric is more energy efficient (only if you don’t consider how the energy is created), work as well as gas (no they don’t, not even new induction ones, are as reliable as gas (not during a power outage, and not other times either), and so forth. They’re trotted out on every single thread, the same spiraling arguments as people try to combat the lies and distortions. It’s like this is the latest windmill that progressives are being encouraged to tilt at.
I love my gas stove but it really is inferior in most ways to electric or more specifically induction. I have extremely good ventilation which most people do not.
> Suddenly this massive propaganda campaign has sprung up on the left to demonize gas stoves.
I don't see it this way. Articles and scientific journals started highlighting health issues related gas ranges in homes years ago, and with greater frequency in the last 2-3 years. None of the discourse I've observed is remotely novel from a health and safety and environmental perspective.
> only if you don’t consider how the energy is created
Where I live most electricity is renewable (hydroelectric) supplemented by nuclear. There's no universe where gas is more efficient for me.
It seems like it's also a good idea to move away from fossil fuels for electricity. With respect to this discussion, one does not necessarily preclude the other.
> work as well as gas (no they don’t, not even new induction ones
Induction ranges are very compelling. Have you used one? You can buy countertop one- or two-element ranges and they're delightful.
If you want to fire something up at high heat quickly, it's hard to beat gas, but induction comes close enough in practice. In truth, I most often cook at the lowest possible heat setting on my range and I wish it could go lower still. I wouldn't have any issues with induction.
> not during a power outage
My gas range's starters won't work without electricity. I definitely don't stock matches in my home but I could get it going if I really wanted. But then there's no way to run the exhaust fan? It's neither practical nor safe.
I don't think any of the demonization of gas stoves is unwarranted, but I'd struggle to call it that. It seems like mostly reasonable discourse, albeit with mostly unreasonable people.
There's articles posted to this very site that point to research 3 and 4 years ago. This has been researched for years. Here's a study from almost 20 years ago, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16268829/
> lies about how electric is more energy efficient
Not a lie, induction is up to 3x efficient, partially because gas shoots the heat component around your pot/pan and heats up the room, whereas induction's energy mostly goes into the pan.
> work as well as gas (no they don’t, not even new induction ones
Explain?
>are as reliable as gas (not during a power outage, and not other times either
During power outage, sure, but nothing wrong with keeping a nat gas grill outside where it's properly ventilated. Can you also explain the "other times" electric is not as reliable as gas?
Induction is more energy efficient if you had any idea how induction cooking works. I guess major municipal gas infrastructure is a zero-cost, zero-maintenance feature too.
I'm not saying "rah rah I hate gas stoves", I'm saying "wow, if they are a source for major indoor air pollution, and we should be migrating off residential fossil fuel anyway, and induction is damned near as good if not better and safer than gas, then everyone should consider induction anyway".
Feel free to also ignore the many people saying that venting should be in the calculus of the air-quality discussion. That doesn't fit your narrative.
Yeah, a report got released after being worked on.
>weak or falsified evidence
I guess articles like this will hash it out, but it's a bold assertion.
>an engineered emergency
I don't think anyone has called this an emergency of any kind.
>using children to emotionally manipulate
Debatable but hard to argue against.
>politicians signally adherence
My instinct would tell me this isn't something most on the left are campaigning on, while reactionary rightists are probably tweeting about freedom (for gas stoves, not the poor, the workers, the non-whites or the ill).
>extreme calls to action
A ban is being discussed, yes. Sometimes government regulates dangerous consumer goods.
Agree - any propagandist paying attention the last couple of years is acutely aware of the contemporary efficacy of labeling "Science" as a manipulative stiumuls. Run a few biased "analyses", pay for placement in a journal and/or get promoted in a few clickbait news rings, syndication through social media...inception into the minds of millions with relative ease.
Your reply is like textbook liberal American foreign policy. Another idea is Iran is developing those weapons to ensure their sovereignty against ruthless western influences. The version of democracy that the U.S. exports to other countries is easily manipulated by the American special interests. It is not done to promote human rights.
> Iran is developing those weapons to ensure their sovereignty
Iran is about as meddlesome in other sovereign states’ affairs as America is. They work to export their influence as much as we do. We do it more and better because we’re bigger. But it’s the same impulse.
So sure, they’re developing nukes to protect their regime. I’m not sure how that’s a hot take, it’s why we have war. The problem is with what and to whom that regime likes doing.
Well I dont agree it’s the same impulse. Iranian sovereignty is directly influenced by the actions of its immediate neighbors. U.S. doesn’t have the same concerns, as they aren’t even on the same continent. Neither regime has the moral high ground, but the Iranian regime has a more pressing obligation to its people to ensure their survival. The U.S. is the expeditionary force acting in foreign lands. Their actions are not equivalent.
> the Iranian regime has a more pressing obligation to its people to ensure their survival
I'm not sure survival of the existing regime is high on the list of priorities of the average Iranian person at the moment...
And the subject of the thread is talking about Iran developing long range weapons and sending them and their drone technicians to Russia, which does not border Iran, in order to facilitate its war of aggression against Ukraine, which neither borders Iran nor possesses any credible threat towards it. The idea that when the US extends its military reach around the world it's an expeditionary force in foreign lands but when Iran does it has only the salvation of its people in mind is textbook anti-liberal double standards...
Syria isn’t Iran’s immediate neighbour. Neither are North Africa or Yemen, but there are natural strategic complements to Tehran having influence in each. Same as America. Again, same impulse, different scales. Iran is no Iceland.
The US is no nation governed by Angels, but orders of magnitudes "better" in most regards. Allies of the US fare much better than those of Iran or Russia. Its citizens have orders of magnitude more rights and access to self-fulfillment, among other things. The insistence on Israel not to get wiped out by an Iranian nuke is hardly a questionable goal.
Only the most black-and-white perspective can justify this false equivalency.
I don’t know, if we were to go off of “total number of innocent civilians murdered globally” for establishing moral high ground, Iran has done less harm than the United States.
Totally bogus metric, actually. You again have to ignore the size and historical comparisons. Or that Iran's current regime has tortured, disappeared, executed or murdered tens of thousands of its own citizens. You have to ignore the circumstances and motivations for some of the wars the US forces killed civilians in. You have to ignore that US forces do a lot to avoid killing civilians, while Iran just doesn't give a damn and actually targets those.
If you think Iran is such a good place, you should move there. As you can't see the moral difference between an imperfect democracy and an authocratic regime, you are certainly not capable of defending a democracy.
American citizens don't regularly march down the street chanting "Death to Iran", though. I mean, that could be just for show. But I sure don't want them to ever have the means to carry it out, so we could see what they would do...
> They claim they want to destroy Israel and call the US the big satan. They aren't famous for rational decision making.
Both of those are very rational ways of ginning up domestic support in a way that commits to absolutely nothing meaningful on the geopolitical stage. There's very little reason to believe Iran's power brokers are privately suicidal.
The US says all sorts of things it doesn't really mean, too.
There's very little evidence the Iranians are acting irrationally.
Their pursuit of a nuclear program is pragmatic (as evidenced by the kid gloves we treat North Korea with, versus how we treated Libya). Their negotiations and the resulting agreement for its suspension was pragmatic. Their response to Trump blowing that agreement up was pragmatic. Their funding of anti-Israeli groups is pragmatic. Their playing up of external threats for internal political purposes is pragmatic.
What genuinely irrational things has Iran done in, say, the last two decades?
> You can't compare the US and Iran on their records concerning threats.
The US made a bunch of "red lines" in Syria, without following through, but I was more referencing stuff like tough talk on human rights contrasting with business involvements in China.
A nuclear weapons program may be in the interest of Iran (though I doubt it). It's not in anyone else's interest.
Much of what Iran is doing is somewhat irrational... meddling in conflicts around the reason in particular is often much to its own detriment, but serves some "irrational" purpose. Same as with posturing over the Hormuz strait, well knowing they can't do shit against the US navy.
Yes, if you ignore all the things contrary to your world view and only look at what fits it, and squint really hard, you can say the stuff you say.
The Navy was present during every incident listed on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strait_of_Hormuz#Events, including seizures of oil tankers and cargo ships. Minefields are also a handy option. Iran can and has disrupted traffic through the strait; it's an effective threat even if they can't keep the US Navy out.
Yes the Iranian Navy can pester a commercial ship here and there. They can't blockade the entire Hormuz street and even if they ramped up those seizures too much, they'd draw an international response they wouldn't like. Iran can't want a shoot out with the US in any form...
It's order of magnitudes easier to stop Iran from getting the bomb rather than "disarming" them completely.
And there are good reasons for countries having at least some kind of army. You need a police force to stop a few gangsters from teaming up and raiding weaker civilians. You need an army to prevent/deter the police forces of your neighbor countries to team up and overwhelm your police force to take your stuff.
