rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
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User ID: 1473
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
3d ago
The "TikTok" ban covers any social networking app controlled by a foreign adversary with more than one million American users, and at the discretion of the President. So if Red Little Book (the actual literally translation of Hongxiaoshu) picks up a million American users at the discretion of the President they can also be forced to sell or be forced off the app stores.
Also AFAIK this is only being kicked off the app stores and being forced to not do transact with American businesses. Existing installations will keep running, albeit with no ad revenue from American businesses.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
11d ago
That doesn't look egregious. Build a fire-resistant concrete home, controlled burn the forest behind the house yearly, keep a few cisterns of rainwater in the attic to wet the ground near the home before the next fire, a generator to pump water from the pool when the power goes out, and keep a go bag ready for evac. These are relatively expensive engineering problems, but not intractable if you have the money.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
11d ago
There have also been allegations that homeless people were lighting fires, I haven't seen any proof of this.
Unlikely. There were 80 mph (120 kph) winds before the fires started, but it was dry for many weeks beforehand without incident, which suggests to me that winds blew down power lines (or equivalently, branches next to power lines), and sparks from shorting cables are enough to get dry brush started.
Humans naturally have a tendency to search for intention in chance events, but here rumors of bad actors deflect blame from the likely cause: mismanagement on the part of PG&E and the local forest/parks service, so I expect those rumors to be encouraged in the media.
I also see people reaching for the Global Warming explanation, but to me this is a series of proximate systemic failures in administration and in holding individuals/companies accountable. Which just about captures half my complaints about the state of American governance: too much consensus-building, not enough action or taking accountability. Definitely a loss of Mandate of Heaven moment.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
21d ago
Thanks. The only person I know with an EB1 works at Apple, so I assumed its usage was roughly equivalent to H1B.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
22d ago
If Elon only wants 15,000 of the best of the best, then the current EB1 and O1 visa processes should be sufficient. EB1 is a green card "for highly skilled foreign workers who have extraordinary ability, are outstanding professors or researchers, or are multinational executives or managers" with a quota of 40k per year, and O1 is a three-year, extensible-until-end-of-contract nonimmigrant visa for "people with extraordinary skills" which admits about 20k per year (22,430 and 23,680 people admitted in 2014 and 2015).
So it sounds like Elon is lying, and wants more than 15,000 individuals. I presume his incentives would be in the direction of having more employer-dependent skilled labor visas like the H1B, but having a higher quota and making them more predictable (remove the lottery, approve faster). This puts him at odds with MAGA.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
1mo ago
Two crazy statistics to think about:
- 51% of Koreans born in 1985 (39 year olds) have never been married.
- 3% of South Koreans are born out of wedlock.
So there is social pressure to not have kids out of wedlock, and more than half the population is deferring marriage until after the fertility cliff. I blame the marriage deficit on high financial expectations on young couples and a culture which teaches that marriage at 35 or later is okay. The birthrate crisis is downstream of the marriage crisis.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
1mo ago
Korean pay scales reward seniority, not technical skills. All engineer starting pay is 1/3 to 1/5 the equivalent US starting salary, except Samsung which is 1/2.
But the US is an outlier in programmer salaries and in minimum cost of living. So someone can live comfortably on 40k USD in Seoul. Compare the US where cheap 100 to 200 sqft rentals don't exist anywhere.
Someday I need to post my student budget. I was able to save up 10k USD over three years while making less than 10k USD annually, paying tuition and living in central Seoul.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
1mo ago
Back surgery works for severe disk herniations, but the mechanism is that it removes pressure on the nerves. The nerves die under pressure resulting in partial paralysis if surgery is not done within 48 (ideally 24) hours. Nerves don't regenerate/grow after age 30 or so.
I'm reading a lot of stories on reddit of people whose back surgeries were delayed 2 to 6 months over insurance stating that a surgery would not be paid for without a diagnostic MRI (which is fair), and a diagnostic MRI would not be paid for without weeks of physical therapy first (which is unconscionable).
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
1mo ago
There's a lot of detail that hasn't percolated into the Western press yet, but I've been watching the videos, and they are wild. Here's a rough timeline:
- 10:23 President announces martial law. Some percentage of civilians immediately head to the National Assembly, many of them coming out of bars.
- 10:?? Police cordon off the National Assembly, barricade the compound's gates.
- 11:00 Martial law command (military) announces that political activities are banned, public assemblies are banned, broadcasts are to be subject to censorship, people may be arrested without cause.
- Also, doctors are ordered to return to work within 48 hours (they walked off last year). I'm happy this is now within the Overton Window.
- Some number of civilians and most Assemblymen jump the National Assembly fence.
- 11:02 The opposition leader livestreams himself making the jump.
- 12:?? Special forces land helecopters on the football pitch of the National Assemby.
- Opposition newscasters and personalities flee their homes and offices. Video of special forces assembling on the street in front of the homes of opposition newscasters and personalities.
- 12:15? Special forces (armed only with simunition) in shoving matches with drunk civilians over the entrance to the National Assembly. Some actual servicemen appear apologetic, but orders are orders.
- 12:30? Special forces lose the shoving match with civilians, break a window to get in.
- 12:40? Special forces repelled by Assemblypeople with fire extinguishers and makeshift barricades. Military didn't look very motivated.
- 12:45? National Assembly convenes.
- 12:45 A friend gets a text from their employer not to come into work tomorrow.
- 01:01 190 votes (unanimous) for a formal request to disband martial law. 18 members of the President's party crossed the aisle.
- 01:10 Military starts to withdraw. Protestors start chanting "arrest Yoon".
Korea was so close to losing its democracy. If the fence were a few meters taller, if the soldiers had arrived 30 minutes earlier, if they had been given live ammo, or if they had followed orders with intent instead of half-assing the arrests they were told to perform, the Assembly would not have been able to reach quorum.
Going forward, President Yoon is fucked. 200 votes are required for impeachment, and it looks like the requisite 8 representatives from the President's party are already pledged. The Constitutional Court needs to try the case, and with three empty seats they do not have enough members to do so, but no doubt the National Assembly will now nominate the one more justice to have a 2/3 majority for the impeachment trial.
There's a lot of wondering how Yoon got elected, but his opponent in the last election (the Opposition Leader who livestreamed jumping the fence) had ties to organized crime and several of his opponents died under mysterious circumstances. The opposition leader has since been found guilty of a number of crimes, but enjoys immunity as a member of parliament.
Finally, it is interesting to contrast this attempted coup to Jan 6th. It tells us what Jan 6th would have looked like if Trump had been actually malicious and motivated to perform a coup: military would have been storming Congress, not directionless protestors. The President would have been in a bunker, not holding a rally. Congress would have been barricading the hallways to maintain their quorum, not retreating to saferooms and giving up the chamber. The military would have been arresting opposition leaders and shutting down broadcasts, rather than totally absent from the Capitol area.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
1mo ago
This is embarassing.
Phone 1: 365, Phone 2: 265, Personal Computer: 84, Work computer Browser 1: 227, Browser 2: 267
In practice, I'm only aiming to close 10% of tabs on the systems I use on days that I use them.
Also, fell into Factorio on the weekend and got nothing done.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
1mo ago
I meant tasks due tomorrow. Thanks for holding my feet to the fire, though.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
1mo ago
Day 2's tasks:
- [ ] Language and science reviews
- [ ] Close 10% of tabs and get inbox to 50
- [ ] 100 pushups, 100 squats
- [ ] 1 hr walking
- [ ] 45 min rowing
- [ ] Drink 2l water
- [ ] File reimbursement requests
- [ ] Data analysis
- [ ] Holiday shopping
I've been pretty lazy this month. Starting now I precommit to daily accountability updates in this thread. Please hold my feet to the fire.
Tomorrow's tasks:
- [x] Language and science reviews
- [-] Close 10% of tabs and get inbox to 50: Closed 10% of tabs, but inbox is at 87
- [ ] 100 pushups, 100 squats: pushups done, squats Fail.
- [ ] 1 hr walking:Fail
- [x] Drink 2l water
- [ ] File reimbursement requests:Fail
- [ ] Set up beeminder?: Bad idea in retrospect
- [x] Watch a lecture
- [x] Outline a lecture
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
1mo ago
Wait. The NHS thinks semaglutide is cost-effecrive? In what formulation? Could you share the math/link with us?
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
2mo ago
They might, but that ignores the collective benefits of vaccines. Imagine that our smallpox vaccine from above kills one in ten. Surely, compared to four in ten deaths from smallpox, we collectively are vastly better off with one in ten deaths and immunity to smallpox, or zero deaths if we can beat smallpox and phase out the vaccine. But now the vaccine company has liability for post vaccine deaths, and so a single dose of the vaccine is going to cost... $1M just to cover the liability. No patient/government is going to pay $1M to save a 4/10 of a life when there are cheaper QALYs to save elsewhere, so we will never beat smallpox and we will see 40% fatality rates in perpetuity.
The fair mathematical solution might be to limit the vaccine manufacturer's liability to the collective damages or to damages external to the vaccine (i.e. negligence). So if you have a vaccine which saves lives (or QALYs) on net, you have no liability, but you'd better be sure your vaccine saves lives.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
2mo ago
No it doesn't, because people don't pay anywhere near the QALY value of vaccines to the vaccine company.
Let's pretend we have a vaccine for smallpox (40-50% fatality rate in babies). People/governments pay maybe $100 per dose (https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines-for-children/php/awardees/current-cdc-vaccine-price-list.html). The value of a wrongful death is $10M, so you would break even on a $100 vaccine for smallpox at one wrongful death in 100,000, while the vaccine would save 40,000 to 50,000 lives per 100,000.
I actually have to compliment @Quantumfreakonomics here, because until 15 minutes ago I thought liability was reasonable.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
2mo ago
I heard rumors that Omicron looked like it was developed through serial passage in lab mice, but do you have any details?
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
2mo ago
I don't know about New York, but in several states any penetration is legally rape if not consensual. Dildo in mouth could be rape. Finger in bellybutton could be rape. Finger in vagina could definitely be rape.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
2mo ago
I think it just doesn't sound right otherwise. To match with the other terms, they need something that is short and not ambiguous. The standard term for the act of sex (sexual relations) is three syllables. They could shorten it to two, but then it would just mean "relationship".
There are also taboos about talking about sex, where even the common euphemisms and clinical terms are not uttered much in public. I guess using the English loanword is the most socially acceptable way to specify "act of sex" in print.
Also radfems seem to get their craziest ideas from their academic connections to the anglosphere, so they use loanwords more than the general public.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
4mo ago
Fair point. That text is not in the law. Removing.
Instead, a clinic employee offered Thurman a two-pill abortion regimen approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, mifepristone and misoprostol. Her pregnancy was well within the standard of care for that treatment.
D&C
No abortion is authorized or shall be performed if an unborn child has been determined in accordance with Code Section 31-9B-2 to have a detectable human heartbeat except when
I am in agreement with you that there would have been no violation of the law as you have quoted, and that the hospital's behavior here sounds egregiously negligent. Under what circumstances is it permissible to wait 5 hours to treat acute sepsis? D&C is usually indicated when a fetus has no heartbeat, and the combination of mifepristone and misoprostol will stop the fetus's heart (mifepristone=shed uterine lining, killing the fetus, misoprostol=induce contractions to push the dead fetus out). So when she showed up at a clinic in Georgia, performing a D&C would have been within the letter of the law.
To steelman the opposing side, perhaps there is another exemption in the law for "care which aids and abets an illegal abortion," or
Anyway, after hearing about the sepsis the lesson is to never visit Georgia, and if you do, never go to Piedmont Henry Hospital in Stockbridge. Never know if doctors there will wait three hours to treat your heart attack because your wife is pregnant.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
8mo ago
That's a good question, but I don't know anything about Japan.
Also, I somewhat dispute that the gender war has "turned hot" in Korea. I think this "gender war" mostly journos trying to make a big issue about gender, for the reasons outlined in the second half of my grandparent comment. Surveys in 2021 showed that in every demographic surveyed, "inequality between men and women" was considered less of a problem in 2021 than in 2016. Also, if you are not terminally online you won't notice any gender war. (But Korean society does tend to be terminally online, so most people are aware of some feminist/anti-feminist drama. )
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
8mo ago
Haha. You fell for the bait! Ok, some anecdotes that come to mind now. Might add more later:
-
Careerist girl in her early 30s spent years watching South Park. Gets really good at English (in a South Park drawl!), but remains single for years. Discovers the Man of Her Dreams on Tinder. Spends two months raving about how perfect he is, how Tinder is different in Korea. Then learns he was also dating three other Tinder girls.
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Staunch feminist sits next to foreign guy on the subway. Guy completely ignores her. She tries to get his attention, he keeps ignoring her. She gets up and starts berating him for "manspreading," threatens to take his picture and put it on Twitter. Incident resolves when he threatens to take her picture and send it to the police for harrassment.
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Tall (= tough dating prospects) artistic (=open-minded) girl falls in love with a foreign guy. Everything seems to be going well, except he's not very patient about her lack of English fluency. He takes her home to meet his family ... and it turns out they all live on a trailerpark. Relationship survives until he goes on a date with another girl. When she does meet a guy who is patient with her, that's one of the points she brags to her friends about.
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Staunch feminist in her early 30s meets foreign guy. Everything is going well, except that he walks out of a movie when it gets to a particularly girl-power scene. She has a two-week identity crisis over meeting someone so "anti-woman".
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Early 20s reader of The Ethical Slut finally finds the rich foreign gentleman she's been trying to snag. Comes back raving about how the first date was amazing, he must have spent $500 between dinner and the hotel, she's finally found the man of her dreams. A week later he has to go on an international business trip, and stops answering his phone. Oddly, his phone is ringing like it's still in Korea ...
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
8mo ago
It's not just the ownership that matters, it's that renting is frouned upon, housing loans are not cheaply available (30% down payment is common, IIRC), housing is treated as an investment, the closing price for typical condos is now 20x~30x the median annual salary. I only know one 20-30 year old who purchased a condo in the last 5 years without parental assistance (and the one guy sold his startup to a conglomerate for millions.)
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