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There are quite a few. Booker and Harris have prepared a bill for example. And a number of organizations have put in proposals as well. There is a lot to read up. Most measures aim to in increase police liability for their actions, some call for diversion of police funding and divert it to community benefits and meadures (I.e. reducing militarization of police). Another thing is that seems to be lost on some. Black folks suffer from the lowest threshold when it comes to police brutality. If rules are in place guaranteeing their safety, then by default other groups will be protected as well.

Well shrimps are arthropods that are widely consumed.

I doubt anyone can predict something with certainty. But there is a good chance that these protests will need to become more organized. They have an unprecedented support throughout the population in part by just heinous the cause was. But there will also be fatigue, especially among white folks (black folks do not have much choice in that matter). At the same time, the fact that about everyone has a recorder in their pockets reduces the likelihood that these events will be ignored. But I suspect that there will be at least local change in some areas, though perhaps not a systematic one and not everywhere.

! Moderator Note I have sincere doubt that promoting forced sterilization will lead to productive discussions. Rather there should be a historic lesson into this types of attitudes in their results. For this reason this thread is locked pending moderator review. Just for clarification, advocating forced sterilization is genocide and we do not promote that here. In addition, it has been pointed out that most of the consumption of resources is in industrialized nations, so if sustainability was an actual concern it would be directed at those nations.

The precise date is uncertain as slaves had no birth certificates as they were obviously considered property. He apparently was listed on a bill of sales in 1859 with his father, though. https://www.tricountytimes.com/opinion/20190207/curious-case-of-sylvester-magee

In that we are in agreement. I think what I felt was missing is that while tribalism or equivalent may be at the heart of racism, history has shaped it into something more systemic, which is at the root of current problems. I also believe that this transcends mere biological responses. The racial assumptions that all of us carry is something that we learn and it is not just a simple reflex. And often it is intentional. If all you learn about Africa is a short passage on subsistence farming somewhere you might be forgiven that you think that Africans still leave in dirt huts with no sanitation. But it is just very ignorant. If you hear whitewashed stories as a Belgian student that it is their ancestor who brought civilization to Congo, it might also colour their attitudes toward black folks without ever seeing one. I.e. racism does not start with seeing that someone is different (i.e. as an extension of a biological reflex). It is a lengthy learning process, which makes unlearning it even harder.

There are several issue with breaking it down to in and out-group recognition. Specifically, groups were defined along different lines, even if they may had racial undertones. But the nature is very different from modern racism. There, for example you will find to have groups (usually enemies) associated with certain negative physical traits. An example the depiction of the Irish during British colonization in the 12th century. However, there was significant less clear delineations in terms of race, ethnicity vs cultural and regional aspects. There is quite some description what the impact of this type of protoracism has (and whether it existed at all) but it is not until the modernity where we have a clear delineation along racial line. And what is even more important and which is missing in your model is that the hierarchical categorization perhaps since Linnaeus (there is some disagreement whether it was really hierarchical but it clearly is at least the precursor of these schools of thoughts). It is only then that we associate systematically certain skin tones with things like temperament and moral character. And it is from there where "white" become synonymous with the norm with which the rest is being measured against. Modern racism is not just a matter of the others. It is about the quality of a given group, if it was there would be a symmetry in prevalent views. It is almost universally accepted that white is not a negative attribute in itself. For many it at least represents power, and to various degree also civilization or ultimately an elite. There is no standing stereotype of whites being dumber or more animal-like in virtual any culture. As such these racial constructs have become so overbearing that it has utterly supplanted the in and outgroup model that you associate with tribalism once race becomes the delineating factor.

Yes, good point. Honestly it is too often the same debunked arguments all over, I wonder whether there is a repository similar to talkorigins, but for racism.

I would differentiate tribalism from racism quite bit. The latter is old, but the latter is a product of the enlightenment where groups were drawn up based on perceived naturalistic features. This notion has spread, through colonialism and other events throughout the world and has become quite persistent. While they can overlap to a certain degree, they are not quite the same.

In order not to appear to be arguing in bad faith, I would ask you to read up on the ongoing and systematic marginalization of black folks in the US. If you have never heard of Jim Crow laws or redlining or any of the measures , it just means that you lack critical knowledge to express informed opinion. What is worse is that same lack of knowledge also leads you to formulate a specific form of historical negationism that is commonly used by white supremacist groups. I.e. that a) it wasn't that bad and they were actually well treated b) that it was ended by the grace of white folks that it was ended. The overall undertone suggests that black folks lack their own agency and their actions have to be seen and directed by their betters. It is not their right to be free, but they were allowed to be free. They were treated right that is why they did not rebel (which is wrong as Swansont pointed out). This, of course is still assuming that the argument was not made in bad faith to begin with. One thing to add is that systemic racism can be baked into historic mechanisms that do not appear to be racial. For example laws that punish certain actions that are more associated with certain groups than others. Or overpolicing certain actions more than others. Even if demographics shift, these mechanisms may not be removed as often they are not considered to be racial, despite having effects along racial borders. Typically, only some level research reveal these inequalities. But sometimes they are also actively enhanced. The historic way to view these inequalities in terms of socioeconomic and health outcomes (African Americans die at triple the rate from COVID-19 than white folks) was to view it as something wrong with the community. Folks were not making right(tm) choices, or they were just culturally off and every now and then there is also the genetic argument. Only recently folks realized (well, actually black folks knew that much longer, as well as folks that bothered to look, but I mean here the overall academic view) has shifted to look at the circumstances and mechanisms leading to these disparities, and it became apparent that laws, rules and as well as simple bias have resulted folks from accumulating generational wealth obtaining worse jobs, create more stress and other issues. I.e. the race-blind research that has been conducted so far did not take specifics of certain groups into account and academia was largely blind to these issues, highlighting generally things from the viewpoint of the majority of a given cohort (which were dominantly white). In fact, research with overrepresentation of black participants were sometimes rejected as being not representative enough. And again, it is a happy illusion that things are fine in Europe. Things are less violent in Europe, for sure, but by pretending that there is no racial inequality there, folks are breeding resentment among visible minorities after a few generations. Often there are small things in the line of "where are you really from" but it can go well beyond them (since ~2010 or so there is actually more research on that matter also in Poland, for example ).

Unlikely, those two groups also suffer disproportionately. "Oriental" is complicated (and suspicious) for a whole bunch of reasons. And the strongest rebuke to this argument is perhaps the fact that Native American and Hispanic groups have joined into the BLM banner. It does seem that predominantly white folks see that as an issue. Possible, but as I mentioned, stacking is a tactic often used against folks with less means (such as black folks). And the worry was that it would be pleaded down to manslaughter (instead of murder in the third). In this case the DA may actually have a decent chance due to the length it took to kill his victim even after he was pleading for his life.

Just read that the DA upgraded the charge to include 2nd degree murder.

I don't disagree.

That is the issue. For a long time in the US (but also elsewhere) racial crime and economic statistics have been used to support the notion that something is wrong with certain folks leading to harsher criminal persecution and further economic disadvantages. There is at least a certain academic sense that this narrative is not only wrong, but also immensely hurtful. I.e. worth outcome is now (again, academically) not seen as a property of a certain project but rather a prompt to look at the context as to why the outcomes are worse. And this is important work. On the other hand, it will not stop certain folks (including politicians and lawmakers) to weaponize that data, though.

I missed the comment, but I have read that the charges laid (third degree murder and second degree manslaughter) may actually have made the situation worse. Many black folks feel that the strategy behind those charges (finding the safest charges that may stick) is in crass contrast to what is often the strategy leveraged against poor and black folks (throwing the book at them to see what sticks, then force them to plead out).

Well, he flip flopped on China quite a bit, praising their strongarm responses (including some favourable views on the Tiananmen massacre), Now he is strongly against China because of his own mishandling of the COVID-19 situation. And I will re-iterate, folks had much more munition to blame China if they had actually had started implementing measures to stop it once it was out of the bag. But only a handful of countries actually did. Don't get me wrong, the information policy in China is abhorrent and it is clear that autocratic regimes are not good partners to combat such international crises. However, their failures should not be used to detract from own failures. It means that one needs to up ones own pandemic game and that the role of international agencies have to be strengthened and not diminished.

I may be going slightly off-topic here, but I like to chime in that while the historic elements are clearly directed against black folks in the US system, the undercurrent is not too different how most countries deal with immigrants. I have always been annoyed how folks, say in Germany, claim to have no systemic racism (or bigotry or whatever floats your boat) problem. But the the truth is that different folks experience the same society in different ways almost everywhere. This is obviously not only along racial lines, gender socioeconomic status etc. are also such elements. However, race (and gender) has always been a visible element at the intersection of these issues. Immigrants always had to work harder and make less mistakes and maybe (but only maybe) they might be seen as something approaching equals. This is something that many folks learn, and it makes sense when they arrive in a new country, but kids in the third or fourth generation get fed up with it. African Americans (and obviously indigenous folks) have been there since the beginning. And it must be way more frustrating to be part of the country for so long and still held at arms-length and still being being scrutinized and blamed for each misstep (which others are allowed to make). Some folks essentially summarized it as a breach of the social contract and ask the question why folks should adhere to it, if they are not accepted to be a full part of it. Edit: I should add that in the US the overall much higher lethality of the police force exacerbates all the underlying issues, whereas a more peaceful society would continue to simmer at a less dramatic level. Edit2: Another thing to add is that especially black communities are hit way harder by COVID-19 than white communities. Economically, health-wise and educationally. The whole situation has highlighted massive disparities.

The study exists it is a pre-print by Qian et al and it was actually one outdoor outbreak involving two cases. The study looked at 1245 confirmed cases and 318 outbreaks overall (the main list was over 7k but some where excluded from the final list) . One of the reason is also because outdoors folks have typically less prolonged contact. One known outdoor outbreak involves a person talking to an infected person, highlighting that prolonged contact can also lead to infection outdoors. However, the majority of outbreaks (~80%) occurred at home.

I may have missed it somewhere but I think it is worthwhile to re-iterate that current data suggest that COVID-19 spreads via droplets rather than aerosols. I.e. most models use a parabolic ejection. There are a few suggestions that it may exist as an aerosol, but most data is not terribly compelling at this point. As such, assuming droplet as the major source of non-contact infection, there are only limited options for ventilation to assist in that regard. Bottom up flow would likely increase the range where the droplets spread and the same goes for lateral flow. It has been discussed earlier that removing droplets before hitting someone is probably technically not feasible, which leaves downward flow. But that has to be mostly laminar otherwise we might get into turbulent mixing which would could keep particles longer afloat rather than dropping down.

The issue here is a lack of direct evidence (e.g. identification of a related coronoavirus in goats). It is a fairly reductionist approach as the total case number is not merely a function of population, but is dependent on a variety of factors such as: a) number of travel-related cases and when they arrived b) measures (or lack thereof) implemented by the government c) infection clusters-evidence suggest that cases cluster together and only spread somewhat slower outside these clusters so travel within a country is also relevant and perhaps the most important factor: d) testing rate, Indonesia has very low test rates (as mentioned above) and also a relative high positive return on tests, further indicating undertesting.

Now contrast that with someone else: https://medium.com/@BarackObama/how-to-make-this-moment-the-turning-point-for-real-change-9fa209806067

! Moderator Note Kindly lay off the ad hominems. Note that Ken Fabian did not downvote your posts; other folks did it (not that it matters).

There have been so many "last" straws, I have lost count. Just a few months earlier, a black jogger was murdered by gun-toting folks but that was not all, while he was jogging he accrued at least two 911 calls, one of them calling because a black guy was running down the street. I am not sure whether this incident will be remembered as extraordinary either. There have been so many mind blowing incidences. Remember John Crawford III? He was killed in a walmart after handling a BB gun in the toy aisle while on the phone. You know, in a store where they also sell real weapons in an open carry state. Police came in after an idiot made a 911 call about a black man brandishing a gun. He was killed before he could he could even react. No charges were laid. Philando Castille is another prominent incident. I submit that these incidences will imprint folks very differently. Even if it ends up non-violent, there have been a string of 911 calls on black folks who did nothing out of the ordinary. Sure, this case seems to be more gruesome than some of the others. And perhaps more importantly, it has been captured on video but many folks do see it as part of larger system of disenfranchisement. The police is not felt as protective agency, at best it is seen adversarial. A common interaction can turn lethal, with higher frequency for some folks (yes, not exclusively, but if embedded in historic experience it sure is heavily slanted). The measures of securing wealth have been systematically moved out of reach. Political powers have been and are continued to be minimized. And to add insult to injury, folks in power deny the experience of minorities, especially of black folks.

So apparently they are trying to remove liability protection. Which in the end could backfire- after all it would mean that the companies would then have an incentive to remove posts that may be construed as, say, call to violence. But it is interesting to see what the US government is focusing on- twitter wars and keeping folks out of the country.

I think it would work best if you could give a specific example of the type and complexity of things you are able to work on. Let's take one example (where I am interested in) which is quite amenable to tinkering: microfluidics. There is a whole range of applications including MEMS, lab-on-a-chip, biosensors and so on. You could take a look at those systems and maybe think a bit a) whether that is something you would be interested to learn about and b) what level of tinkering you would be able to do (e.g. reproducing a particular design in a different system or designing new systems, etc.). The field is quite a bit more established than it used to be, so there are already tons of designs and ideas out there so making something novel slowly becomes more difficult. Conversely, it means there is a lot to read up and get inspired in.