We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings.

To me that seems like a bold claim considering “the divine right of kings” has not been successfully resisted nor was it escaped from. Monarchies still exist on every continent, people of royalty still get more rights and better treatment than others, once-royal families still possess loads of wealth, still rule countries in high political positions, still own many companies and other wealth generating assets. Humans have gained unfair advantages due to their lineage for thousands if not tens of thousands of years and I highly doubt that this will change massively in the next thousand years.

Regardless, it still sounds like a really nice speech though.

How about ducks?

You mean besides the religious ritual aspect and telling people what to do? From a medical perspective that seems to be the whole idea yeah.

😄 Wordplay!
A quick note since it might not be clear, I just randomly assumed that doctors need about 1 or 2 hours to consult with the patient and do the operation. With an average hourly wage in South Africa according to “the internet” of about $15 to $20 and medical tools/facilities costing an estimated $10 or so. Maybe it’s a bit more or less, but those numbers seemed sane and careful enough. Like all the numbers in my estimation they could easily be off by a factor of two or so. Also, since this is about disease prevention note that this is hopefully not done by some random black market quack doctor.

I was curious about the source used for this graph and found it’s a free book that’s available online in the National Library of Medicine (of the US). Here’s Chapter 7 of the book Disease Control Priorities as referenced in the picture.

Why does it make you suspicious? Oh I see, blades near genitals sure are scary.

On the statistic: A little bit of a snip doesn’t seem very expensive to me. I wonder if this statistic also includes the cost for consulting with the doctor or the reduced risk of spreading HIV to other people. According to some reports on the topic by the World Health Organization and US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, it seems to reduce the risk of HIV infection by a bit more than 50% and reduces other infection risks too.

Assuming $1000 can afford about 20 to 50 circumcisions, assuming they happen almost exclusively for high risk males (eg men with wife working as a sex worker, or wife living in high risk areas in south/east africa, or men frequently changing sex partners) and assuming this extends life spans for about 5 to 20 years by preventing an infection, those numbers kinda seem sane.

edits: Added links, better formatting, some extra comments, etc.

I don’t really know much about this topic even after reading the article. It does bother me however that there’s so many channels/server on Telegram full of spammers that seem to offer drugs and prostitution. It’s almost like those were the only things that exist in this world. Which is such a huge waste of a chat program.

Also who the hell listens to any of the nonsense influencers/politicians write in their heavily biased channels, seriously, I can’t find a sane reason to join those, yet strangely that seems to be the only reason the masses use this tool. It’s all just confusing.

I think rating genres is generally not a useful thing. I feel as though pidgeonholing games, music, videos or other things into categories and judging them based on that could lead to narrow-mindedness. Each genre has great games and each genre has bad games.

Some genres are more interesting to some people, but I’d say that’s because hobbies are sort of random and not because some are better than others. If by chance you happen to get a deeper knowledge about a certain genre or topic you will become more interested in it naturally. That doesn’t mean other things are more boring by nature.

Considering the comfy curled up pose of the cat I was thinking since AI already has problems generating hair/fingers/toes due to their variety, how difficult would sleeping/lying cats be.

It’s a vampire cat!

Well at least the sun actually exists and you can see and feel it and measure it with many different devices. It’s nice when people appreciate an actual physical body and this one certainly has forces at work that far exceed ones imagination. Considering humans are “stardust” and we need sunlight, it even makes sense to call stars creators of life.

Some people worship cookies, others worship smartphones, animals or a person of the opposite sex, hell even nowadays many non-religious people worship singers, politicians, influencers or what have you. I wonder if any culture worships galaxies or black holes or some other objects in space that are not a big ball of hot plasma, a planet or a moon.

What exactly do you consider insane about it?

From this limited view pedestrians seem to have a pretty nice place there. Crosswalks are highlighted strongly and there’s no traffic lights to slow down pedestrians so they have the priority and the necessary attention. Sidwalks seem wide enough as well.

Yes the road is wider than the bike path, but they each have one lane per direction and there don’t appear to be any sharp turns. The bike lane should perhaps be a little wider, but if there’s only a low number of cyclers it seems equal-ish.

I feel like the little “hill” where the bike lanes and crosswalk intersect should start earlier, that way bikes could come to a halt at the top of the hill and wouldn’t have to accelerate through it, instead they could use it as a sort of break to build up potential energy for a little speed boost later on. Either way the hill seems like a decent idea considering bike drivers occasionally try to drive past pedestrians without a clear path, overestimating their agility - especially at high speeds.

While one could argue for a similar hill on the road, I’d consider that an unnecessary nuisance for the bus driver and passengers. Being shaken around while getting up for a stop is not a nice experience. A hill would also scratch the underside of a low-floor bus.

Ideally bus and tram stops should probably be placed just before a crossing, not after. That way the bus doesn’t block view of pedestrians for cars coming from the opposite direction. The bus driver will usually have to stop for the station either way, so might as well combine the stop for the station with the stop for the crosswalk.

That said I’d argue it’s more of a pedestrians > cars > bicycles or maybe even a pedestrians > cars/bycycles system. Not quite as bad as your suggestion, but still not ideal.

edits: Added a comment about bus stop location. Added comment on low-floor bus.

Not just libraries and businesses, but also religious facilities, clubs with a focus on social interactions, etc. Oftentimes they can provide rooms.

I guess it might depend a bit on where you live. In the city I live there’s free social events in many different places, sometimes in stores, other times in religious buildings or clubs (organizations). Since you mentioned libraries, I rememberfree DND sessions are hosted at a local library. Like others have mentioned sometimes people just need to contact such places and ask if they can organize events there. Using existing connections can help but is probably not a requirement.

What do you mean when you say they’re paywalled?

I feel like comparing OTTD to OpenLoco is a bit similar to comparing Freeciv to Freecol. OTTD and Freeciv just had so much more popularity and development. But OpenLoco and Freecol are still nice to try.

Of course! TTD and Locomotion were developed by the same person. From my understanding Locomotion is closer to the Roller Coaster Tycoon engine and UI. Also I think I remember reading an interview in which Chris Sawyer said Locomotion had the cleanest code out of the three.

On that note, considering the original engines are similar I wonder if OpenRCT2 and OpenLoco have any big similarities in the code base as well…

That’s an interesting view/idea. Is that a reoccurring theme in politics? Like, I’m wondering if there have been similar cases and if yes how well did they work.

I can imagine something similar happening at school, where eg. kids who litter or destroy plants or furniture are assigned to cleanup/anti litter duty or to gardening work or to furniture maintenance. I think I remember seeing similar things, the idea being that it helps those kids learn to better understand the work that goes into such tasks and the value behind them. Basically it helps build your morals and values or something along those lines.

The way I see it maybe this decision could promote gender equality organisations that are active in Saudi Arabia. It could create or increase social awareness for this topic. Being given a responsibility can make you put more effort into it than you did before because suddenly the effort counts twice.