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Showing content with the highest reputation on 07/26/24 in all areas

  1. The indolent apes of Punt Were much too lazy to hunt Their penchant for sloth Was protected by Thoth So their life skills tended to stunt.
    3 points
  2. Hmm, the relevance of those - obviously impressive - skills to those required in politics is not clear to me. Businessmen and military men do not always succeed in politics. They may be insightful and decisive leaders, but they tend to operate in structures in which obedience is built-in. Often they are not that well trained in consensus-building and the use of committees and other political processes to achieve gains, or in effective communication with electors whose interest in, and attention span for, political propositions is very limited. That's why many of them tend to be a bit, well, fascist in outlook (Exhibit A: Elon Musk). Kelly obviously is far from that, but nonetheless I see little reason to think the skills he has inherited from military aviation and the space programme are key to being a successful vice-president. Though they certainly may give him a personal aura of toughness and competence, which can help with getting the public to listen to him. By the same logic I would agree that a law career may not be the ideal skill set either. However it does have 2 relevant advantages. First, a good advocate has to be able to persuade a jury. This is a performance art, which can help with persuasive public speaking. Second, a lawyer has to understand law and is thus in an informed position when it comes to dealing with lawmakers or negotiating changes to laws being made.
    2 points
  3. .....which she is not being slow to point out! My worry with her is she doesn't actually seem to be that good at inspirational speaking - perhaps like our own new PM, Starmer, also a former advocate, who is good at forensic analysis and cross-questioning to expose weaknesses in an opponent, but not possessed of high flights of oratory, like an Obama, say. I'm relieved she is starting to articulate a +ve vision of what she stands for, which seems to be loosely all around personal freedom. This can link things together like reproductive rights with the partisan control of the state envisioned in the deeply sinister Project 2025 and freedom from fear, as offered by better gun control (Exhibit B: Trump's ear?). So she does now seem to have more to say than just -ve attacks on Trump. Actually projecting something positive and a bit of happiness will be a real contrast with the permanently angry and abusive, self-centred negativity of Trump. So I'm crossing my finger she can make it. The whole of Europe is desperately hoping Trump loses, as our future as free countries at peace may be in the balance. (Have you seen that Russia has just sabotaged the French railway network, via 5 separate, simultaneous attacks on signalling and cabling at critical railway junctions, to try to turn the Olympics into chaos? The French arrested one Russian agent last week, but evidently there are more of them at large. More here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c28eyr3y18yo)
    1 point
  4. I would argue that this depends on the timeline. If we talk about species, we implicitly project long time lines (such as, until extinction, for example). Conversely societal benefits can be short-term. But if we add sustainability to the mix the timeline for what we consider societal benefit gets extended (i.e. it should not only be good for the current, but also for future generations). At which point what one might consider beneficial would converge. Edit: I should also add that one should not assume that selective pressure are all to the benefit of the species (as in creating a more successful species as implied by some comments). After all, a lot of species went extinct following highly successful and specific adaptations. It is possible to specialize oneself into a corner, for example.
    1 point
  5. 1) yes, or more precisely we have the interconversion of NADH <-> NAD+ + H+ + 2e- 2) Not quite, it is the initial donor. The chain is basically a redox gradient, starting with NADH and ending with the terminal electron acceptors. 3) Also not quite, NAD+ is regenerated during the first step of the electron transport chain, following the reaction shown in 1). The electrons then continue to move through the chain, which powers the proton pumps. That is not part of regeneration of NAD+ per se, but just the process necessary to ultimately gain energy from the whole ordeal (the gradient in turn powers an ATP synthetase). 4) Simply put, yes. When there is oxygen, cells can use respiration to get more energy rather than having to rely on fermentation. That being said, under the right conditions (e.g. very high glucose surplus) some cells also conduct fermentation even in presence of oxygen. Here, cells prioritize rapid energy generation via glycolysis over the more efficient, but slower process of respiration. But this is only possible if glucose is not a limiting factor (as it is often the case in nature).
    1 point
  6. You would do well to read the whole thread, so that you fully understand other's views, before commenting with references to Nazi Germany, as you also did in the Incel thread. Is that a common theme with amateur psychologists ? Last I checked, an asteroid impact equivalent to 10 000 times the world's nuclear arsenal is not a predator. But I do agree, the sky is full of them. We call them birds. Thanks MSC, you seem to be the only one who got the point of our original discussion. The benefit of society is not necessarily the benefit of the species, and vice versa. Others are merely choosing to attack the examples I provided of 'not necessarily', which in itself indicates some cases fit and some don't. You also seem to have recognized how the ( mistaken ) belief that people were benefitting their society, almost caused the extinction of a group of people ( Jews are not a separate race ) in Germany, 90 years ago. But there are many more such examples.
    1 point
  7. You might find this one simpler and more digestible.
    1 point
  8. Dad will be allowed to pass in two weeks, when his life support is to be stopped, on the advice of the expert's the family has decided that Jesus better get his skates on and forgive the ol' bugger. RIP the day after yesterday... 😉
    1 point
  9. Well, you could have at least explained why we do not use kelvin. This is a good explanation for why we do not use frequency for heat. My thought is proven wrong. +1
    -1 points
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