xeneks

xeneks t1_j7ki4qg wrote

I am looking at parametric search, where I can highlight in a graph-database style way, the mistakes with the results, by reassigning weights or links, to redo the search, until I get answers that are more correct, based off things like 'water isn't useful for cleaning dried paint, acetone or paint thinners may be more useful'. Is it possible to build such features into any of the open source tools here, or are lacking any gui for the feedback, beyond text and a thumb up or down as one sees in the commercial packages?

1

xeneks t1_iyfe71p wrote

So what I’m getting here is that while they look the same…

with one tiny chomping Bangladesh eats Suriname, and it probably doesn’t even quell the hunger of all the Bangladeshis!

I would depict this differently. If this is disturbing, please note it and concentrate, think, innovate and suggest an improvement because I really don’t have enough good ideas or time to refine them.

Firstly, I’d animate it slightly, like live videos. About 1-2 seconds of animation. Maybe 3 or 4 if it’s incomprehensible.

Then I’d have the 2D representative of the country turn 3D and go side on. Bangladesh would be seen as massively thick, Suriname as impossibly weak. This could also be done by shrinking and expanding them.

Then of course you have Bangladesh turn into something with teeth and chomp on or step on Suriname, to highlight how tiny it is in population, insignificant. That would be memorable.

How would I do this without animation or disturbing things like visual imagery where a nation eats another?

Hmm.

Maybe fun, to create insight and an appreciative ‘oh that’s why’?

Ugh, hhm er,

Ok. An idea.

Physically, people understand piles. Loose stuff that supports itself under gravity.

It’s instinctive and instantly understood.

Piles have an advantage, they can be seen. Like.. piles of dirt. A hill or mountain. A pile of stones - A pyramid. Also as the base is wide you can fit bigger volumes in a pile than is more pyramidal that in a pile that is cylindrical.

So, you could present it with the nations or states on one side, one above the other. Hmm nah

That’s probably going to make people think one country is better than another.

Hows this. Two tone.

The existing map stays the same but is shaded or faded out at 50%.

Then you get rid of the arrows and the thick lines representing populations.

Then you create a dual hourglass shape. Or 4 triangles. You have the different populations represented by the teardrop shape of a horizontal or vertical hourglass, or by piles, hills or pyramids. And you have them doubled up and reversed so that it’s clear you aren’t indicating that one is above another or only left of another or right of another in the altered visual depiction of the population. You could have them sort of.. fat bum to bum, offset so that they aren’t pointing to each other.

. D

Or

D .

Like here above. The D symbol is Bangladesh population. I use it as a ‘pile’ sitting horizontally.

The . symbol Is Suriname population.

This respects that you aren’t indicating that there’s a flow from one to another that passes through a tiny chokehold, that might indicate elitism or superiority or exclusivity or stressful junk messages like that.

Triangles or pyramids might also indicate the difference well. Offsetting them means they fit in the space given.

To do the pile vertically as if it’s created by, or subject to gravity, is better.

But that’s got to be reversed and duplicated as some people might think that one flows to another or is threatening another or is above another or might bury another.

Most people don’t think like that but some do, and that might mean the graphic becomes perception altering media, that heightens antagonism that further or spur rivalries or discontent. By ensuring you duplicate and flip the data without change you present it neutrally as you counterbalance the weighing caused by the physical positioning of the piles or pyramids relative to another.

Ok, but not fun. No smile with appreciation and compassion. No laughter. A chuckle with a grin that creates camaraderie on earth. This is tricky.

One person’s trivia is anothers hate or complication or distraction or waste of time. One person’s joke can be another one’s insult.

Hmmm

Maybe.. make the pyramids or teardrop or raindrop shapes showing population size in area,

But bring common human things in. Universally understood. Ahh, ummm.

Piles of birdseed? Hmm nah. Faeces? A bit iffy and sticky. Nopeing out of that.

Animals? Faces? No, the population of Suriname is too small to caricaturize the piles or drops or pyramids.

Resources like water or food? Nah. Not good. The issue there is that resource competition is sometimes aggressive, if not at the minister or administrator political level, then at the perception of wealth and unequal distribution.

There must be something you can use.

Fart gas? Anthropogenic Global warming and the livestock industry makes that traumatic for some, especially if sea levels rise rapidly to 60 Meters.

What about grains of sand? Piles of sand?

That might work. Sand is everywhere nearly.

‘If the people were as sand, this is their population’

Any better suggestions?

−1

xeneks t1_iyc7ho4 wrote

I’m looking forward to when I can say }%^# that’s annoying and the algo says ‘would you like me to elaborate on that and post it on reddit?’ And when I say yes, it composes some epic essay of complaint for me that doesn’t include the }%^#.

2

xeneks t1_iy7qyny wrote

Graphene, other 31 million materials etc, all share a common risk. No way to recycle or unmake them.

I’d be more impressed if the AI could handle cleaning up a landfill of toxic materials. How about ways to take 31 million new contaminants in drinking water… out of the water? I am pretty sure you don’t need more material to reach high numbers of unremovable contaminants. There are probably enough contaminants in waters and soils and air already to pose a challenge for removing.

0

xeneks t1_iy7q3oq wrote

Big tech companies are people. People make companies. People keep them alive.

The company is nothing without people. So it’s not that people are years behind companies or that companies are years ahead, it’s simply that any individual you look at will usually seem insignificant, compared to a company.

Yet the companies are made of lots of insignificant people. That makes all of them significant, provided you don’t fall in the habit of assuming they are there to be superior to anyone. If you’re looking for problems you will often find them. Occasionally you need to let the companies sit a while to reorganise themselves a bit around changing priorities. Sometimes the strategies change.

An example for me is clothes washing. I leaned about micro plastics. Since then my strategies have changed. I learned about plant based eating. Since then, strategies changed.

The strategies aren’t so special. More of a ‘set of directions and principles to try to apply’.

7

xeneks t1_ix6brry wrote

This is why the most intelligent people you get in science are kindergarten kids, where they actually get to rest on a daybed after a meal. :)

Definitely will follow, but also will encourage workplaces to have daybeds or places where you can sleep a powernap, so that quality and skill level and competence continually increases rather than stagnates.

1

xeneks t1_iv7z3mx wrote

Actually they do.

It lags the leading edge though. I think that’s due to the large time it takes to recode at simple or base levels, replacing routines or libraries or writing entire new code bases or implementing algorithms that take advantage of unique or abstracted hardware.

Having rewritten software using new codebases with new libraries or upgraded dependencies often addresses software bloat issues. If you upgrade the OS you can often run more recent apps.

Guessing mostly,

If you take a bunch of computers that is <1 yo and the best os & software you can find. The software choices often work fine, but are actually not so optimised. Sometimes they are brutal in their resource requirements.

Then you take a bunch of computers >5 yo. And you install the best os & software you can find. The software choices apply many code optimisations that actually take substantial advantage of the full set of hardware features.

It’s another reason why old hardware is amazing and always worth keeping, repairing and maintaining and even, actively using privately, professionally or commercially.

It’s why even a low end old mobile phone is worth spending hours to repair, service, and make hardware reliable on.

Apply upgraded OS or different apps, suddenly the phone is a completely different machine, not only functional, but usable and even satisfying and enjoyable to use.

This is really easy to do with PCs, that typically run windows or linux, but with phones or with Apple hardware it’s less possible due to the closed development environment.

I’ve done it using jailbroken android stacks though, and been very happy as old hardware suddenly works equal to new hardware with no additional resources or pollution and water needs, and deferred recycling costs.

When old hardware is reliably and operating consistently, or even only low cost but working well and repairable, you really warm to the manufacturers.

Source:

Personal/professional experience over 20+ years of trying to get new optimal OS & software working on old hardware, to avoid disrespecting embedded resource, material, carbon costs, water and air pollution.

Ps: 1nm… low power! Low temperature! Awesome! I’m thinking this might create the first generations of hardware for computers, phones and tablets that might be in-field functional past two decades… I hope it’s able to be adjusted to remain viable even if hardware code exploits are discovered after a decade or more of use. Aside from microcode, what other approaches are taken to make hardware reliable aside from air gaps and isolation from networks?

6

xeneks t1_iugtbjk wrote

Re: diurnal temperature range (DTR)

I’m confused. I thought a key issue of climate change was that you would have more seasonal variability and greater extremes, not a reduction in variation.

I wonder if this correlates with rainfall variability declining?

I assume heatwaves then will be on top of a pronounced higher base temperature for more of the year.

1

xeneks t1_iugs9lb wrote

The waste being diluted enough so it’s able to be treated and doesn’t solidify or clog in pipes is something that I am sure is an actual issue. I wonder if they have to add water sometimes to offset the water saving of residents who achieve amazing low water consumption patterns? Also, if they have to add water to be able to actually process the wastewater as it’s received? This is why I think a way to create little bags of faeces like in the martian movie and book, makes sense. The faeces is a high cost, high value component. Simply bagging it means suddenly pipes have less physical material to address, and also, the faeces isn’t contaminated with other chemicals such as detergents or hair or clothes or or teeth or hand washing compounds.

2

xeneks t1_itj4f95 wrote

It’s not an improvement on failed farming techniques that deplete soils that sometimes takes thousands to millions of years to form in short generations.

There was a number I read. That’s right… (likely incorrectly recalled)

A rock or tree with a thousand years of untouched lichenous growth contributes to only a centimetre of soil.

I actually think that number is optimistic, but lichens do act as little air filters, so maybe they are strong net contributors to soil accretion, as they capture airborne particles much as in water filter feeders and fan growths with commensal bacterial colonies contribute to reducing suspensions that make water murky.

I don’t see many of those laser beams creating topsoil. Only some ash, of limited value, not even making biochar or coal. It might be different if the foliage was incredibly diverse and the laser beams were simply snipping off leaves and seeds and flowers of weeds or supporting species to fall to create a natural cover to the soil to improve moisture retention.

Actually, that doesn’t work if the beams shoot out.

Uhhh, you need a mechanical arm than has a small horseshoe on it. It shoots a laser that acts like a simple knife. The beam is captured to avoid splaying around. The plant may have the stem sprayed to improve beam absorption. Woody stems are cut and stored. The beam cuts the softer stems making the foliage fall. A few drops of biochar from previously collected and processed woody stems is dropped.

The ground gets a mulch cover with biochar that encourages insects as carriers of mycelium and bacteria that improve soil qualities and biodegrade the fallen plant material. Rock dust in solution can be sprayed or squirted in a hard forming gel to compensate for time constraints (no thousands of years of erosion in one season), and lack of flooding events that would usually replenish silts that increase nutrition.

The multiple species means nitrogen fixing bacteria can be encouraged as I read that many plants grow better when supporting species have merged root networks, reducing the need to add nitrogen to the soil using synthetic fertilisers.

There’s an increase in complexity and some risk from insect and other loss from their potential spreading of plant diseases. But with rapid response and in field mobile devices for disease ID and seeking treatment approaches those risks are far less than they they were only a decade ago.

There is l also likely a substantial benefit in the access to finance as banks may negotiate lower interest loans due to the soil scientifically demonstrated as being supportive of valuable agricultural efforts for longer periods before depletion. Or even negative financing where you’re paid to caretake soils that are in need of remedial efforts which require intelligent intervention, while producing food as well.

The machinery depicted is not as useful as it seems, it’s more sci-fi fantasy as it’s expensive and itself is very destructive to manufacture and maintain and deliver and recycle. I wager most soils become worthless when treated like this for too long! ‘Ok, lasers engaged, soil must die! Dirt you become!’

But where populations don’t enable people to do the field work as there aren’t enough, a machine might be scalable. You’d highlight the machines limitations. They are by nature inadequate and less superior to people of health. So to avoid people becoming dissuaded or lazy and arrogant you would ensure that market would highlight how the machine is a limited aid for specific circumstances only, and that a person on a small handholding which has a high population would get good results from using hand held cutters to manually trim the species to create the ground cover, or simpler machines that don’t need massive teams and industry sprawl to maintain them.

Banks and financial organisations can encourage a balance that puts soil and water conservation first to maintain the asset that grants life to society, by paying more attention to soil remediation techniques, and linking borrowers or users of credit to organisations that promote sustainability over millennia not years or decades.

Laser beams, not nearly as useful as they seem…

−6

xeneks t1_ititwy8 wrote

That’s genius! My family tends to be less keen on regular swimming. Our sunlight is powerful at our latitude, a light based maceration of skin, more-so if you don’t eat or are unprotected and it’s later in the day. I love your idea of feeding people. It’s one of the advantages of industrial food that is sterile and processed and sealed in polluting packaging, you have less ‘food poisoning’ risks or ‘this might make me ill’ concerns from the people you offer it to. Freshly prepared food is so often rejected as suspiciously risky. You setup a smorgasbord of fresh foods that are home cooked, rarely do people accept the food from strangers if the preparation isn’t transparent. There’s a vast gulf of mistrust. I wonder how to overcome that when not using industrial processed foods but instead fresh foods that are powerhouses of nutrition and also still living?

Ahh. Got it. Some ideas for you. Do with them as you will.

Bifold approach, maybe trifold.

Nutrition/Education

  1. You prep fresh food. Something with living cells. Plants, no meats. Processed only just enough to make it tasty and easy to chew or swallow at speed.

  2. Have someone (A companion) eat it, happily slowly snacking to show it’s there for eating and will be eaten :)

  3. Offer it. Also offer the recipe. Have a label recipe card template you keep. As in, a summary recipe that you handwrite out onto thinner papers that can be folded to a pocket if someone wants the recipe. Maybe a5. You use a special pen and paper so you’re not contributing to paper waste.

  4. You package it on the spot. Packaging is ‘zero carbon, pre-offset’. As in, it’s carbon offset already. Labelling as such. Big words so it’s an educational packaging material itself. Logo and text indicates ‘aid us by avoiding landfill to reduce consuming the offset’. This way the packaging is a zero waste stress. Other words might say ‘food is the greatest carbon cost. Make your life more than only consumption. Seek guidance on ecology and sustainability’ or something similar.

  5. The packaging is engineered to avoid people getting embarrassed if they make a mess when eating. Eating without being a filthy slobbering crumb dropping messy animal isn’t easy when you’re worn down and struggling, or your teeth are a kissing crime. But avoiding the perception of being a filthy slobbering crumb dropping animal is even harder, because people fear judgement or mocking or laughing even when it’s less than likely. No one wants to eat and be criticised making a mess. So they sometimes avoid eating. The cleaner the environment the more likely this occurs unless they are brutally uncaring of others thoughts! Erm, so yes. Packaging has to make it easier to eat and reduce mess. I’m a fan of burgers and modern plant burgers are unbelievable in potential and taste better than ground dead animals. The old corner burger shop, non-chain store, has an art sometimes in wrapping a burger in paper, so it not only doesn’t dribble beetroot juice in your lap, but also doesn’t fall apart. It’s sad they don’t often use plant based meat-like materials in those burgers as they are a worship, worth the price for excellence in wrap alone.

  6. You package the food so eating is graceful even for the easily embarrassed, but you then have to address the cleanup. Mouth and teeth. Also breath. People reject eating when they are ashamed of dirty teeth. They also stop smiling as they don’t want to have food residue and are over-programmed by all the idiotic media that’s sickly perfect in image and appearance. Some don’t care but most people who are weaker in spirit and self confidence and assurance reject smiling when their teeth may have food on them. And it’s not fun being accused of bad breath so you then avoid getting physically close enough or talking directly to people to avoid them shying away from what is a rapidly disintegrating breath. What helps here is gargling and swishing.

  7. Toilets. Eating leads to urinating and defecation. Many people are afraid of going to the toilet as they inevitably smell like one when they return. They loose the ability to hold it in, gas or even what is sometimes called a ‘number 2’. The number 1, how often do old people stink of pee? They spend a lot of time in their life telling others to be clean and smell good, so when they might dribble some urine or smell like an unflushed loo, they avoid eating or drinking as they don’t want to themselves be ‘the one who smells bad or looks like they pissed themselves’. So easy attitudes and a practical approach that is humorous and tolerant is valuable. That actually reminds me, I rarely see slogans on shorts. I should get a pair of shorts that says ‘this is where I usually piss myself’ pointing to the crotch area. I’m nearing 50 myself and often shake and don’t wipe, paper is precious, as it’s from trees, and we likely don’t have enough of those to sustain our soils or maintain water cycles.

Edit: so what helps here are small portions.

Simple pre-packaged foods that have additives and are fortified go a long way towards addressing all the above issues. So I think that’s a great way to keep the old farts kicking and hopefully pulling their weight. :)

Edit: I nearly forgot to fully articulate in textual way, the third component after nutrition/education. It’s the direction. Old people forget the daily activity needs to be purposeful. The most amazing people often slump inside until they become careless and dismissive of environmental efforts and dismissive of people in general. This slumping is from their inability to directly effect change. When the world is physically suffering, with soil depletion, water scarcity and pollution, and air nearly everywhere becomes sickening over a lifetime when breathing it without a filter, the only thing that addresses the issue is a sound direction.

Nutrition/Education/Direction.

The direction should be toward effort not entertainment. Old people have a really great advantage here. They can slow the rushed, and apply consistence, and create respect for their generation. Anyone rational who would see the way a retired person declines while consuming the planet and resources desperately and urgently needing an adjustment to equitable sharing, would be incensed and full of spite and anger and dismay. When an older person directly and with a glint is able to put the goal of ‘now to consume until I die’ behind, and steadfastly with a care for all, push past age ideals and support themselves and others even when people might write them off as worthless, they bridge the difficulties of respect that comes from differences in assets and power.

0

xeneks t1_itghkum wrote

I think old farts don’t get down on hands and knees to sniff the ground and study things up closely, nor do they engage in nonsense and frolic. Try getting an old fart to jump off a ledge into a pool or sot around doing sfa for an hour while slapping mozzies or swishing flies away. Also getting cold and wet or sunburned, also terrifying. They rarely get around barefoot. Also did you see what they eat? Besides when you’re an old fart you often need to be near a toilet. And bringing new friends or letting randoms sleep over before you go out together somewhere, is that a grandpa or grandma thing? What ability going without food or worse, going with food you can’t chew or you don’t like.

The older generation sure make it difficult for themselves to enjoy going out!

So

−20

xeneks t1_itevm6b wrote

If you imagine people as ‘on strike’, who say no to anything that means working more or doing anything themselves, then what you need is habit breaking science.

If their habit is to drive cars and fly planes and watch media that’s entertainment only and fight or battle and say no to things like de-development or negative growth, and they say ‘no’ to plant based diets or eg. Ceasing caffeine or alcohol, or are reluctant to quit damaging but cushy jobs, even if they complain about the low income when they are in the top 1% or 2% of income earners on earth, you’ll be stuck with a lot of people who are nearly impossible to persuade to take the path of leadership. It gets worse when they want to build more things or make everything they have bigger or more luxurious but don’t want to recycle or remove the old things.

You’re essentially stuck needing to break thousands of interlocking habits. Where people are social and those habits are reinforced in families or in friendships and positive change towards ecological sustainability or resource sharing or responsible consumption exists, it’s more than science that is needed.. it’s massive data science. The social interject to break the habit or disrupt it to lift the person to a place where they are no longer the burden to the planet, causing the extinctions, is tricky.

Typically media is used. Eg. A shocking show on animal welfare. Or a report loaded with hyperbole on some catastrophe. Or something creating social terror via financial stress. Or legislation change that enables an industry to be penalised for terrible carelessly destructive to ecosystem activity. What was the latest? Oh - no doubt it’s real. The rain with PFAS PFOS OR PFOA, no longer drinkable, without a measurable risk increase. To hopefully reduce people consuming rain, as it’s so despairingly depressing to see the cataclysmic extinctions seemingly unavoidable, as all the ecosystems are fragmented and lacking water and the climate changes causing many species to loose habitat that includes food or water, as the environmental ranges or biological thresholds of the suffering life is exceeded, and the captive species are unable to migrate.

This is in all places where cities but especially suburban sprawl and farmland exists, and parks are isolated and not connected, and only rarely have sound water resources that would see through drought or seasonal thermal variations.

The ‘interjection’ - to break habits, is not vicious or hurtful or inciting angst, the goal is simply to save the person from their own routine. It’s a ‘how to avoid the tragedy of the commons’ habit breaker. It could be as simple as getting people to stop tea or coffee. Or to choose to drive less or not at all. Or to skip a flight for a HD video link or a recommendation to visit somewhere local that is similar.

The science of breaking routines and habits.. is there one?

1