It’s also really expensive

This is the reason. Conspicuous consumption is a pox on us all.

The trick to capitalism is to pay very close attention to who is asserting that it is a virtuous system. Not unlike the proper way to read a fortune cookie, one must add the phrase "for me" to the end of any such statement.

Did... did he actually say this? I knew this guy was full of it, but that's a whole other level.

You should know that there is data that backs you up: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8875377/#sec5-nutrients-14-00739

And also on the self-medicated front: nicotine is effective too. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8741955/

What this makes me wonder is how much of the population is self-medicated in this way but doesn't know it?

Extreme anxiety.

For the longest time, I couldn't recruit enough concentration to get homework or big projects done until it was this huge looming threat. Frequently, that would involve an all-nighter since it was something due the next day. Other times, it meant cranking out last night's math assignment in home room mere minutes before it was due. It turns out that adrenaline and other stress hormones are great at shoving all the ADHD noise out of the way, however temporarily.

I love that "Uh, guys?" is a real in-character reaction and moment in many episodes of SG1. This story easily could have been a plot in the show.

While Star Trek had these wonderful "this is why we explore the galaxy" moments, SG1 wasn't afraid to place characters face-to-face with something or someone that would just erase existence or end humanity if the next moment wasn't handled the right way.

To be fair, other characters step up to fill the void, but it's too little, too late.

As someone who lives next to a road where this racket happens around the clock: screw those guys. I know there's an overall theme of car companies externalizing environmental impact to the general public, but it's like they went through a list and realized that "noise pollution" was worthy of a tad more exploitation. /rant

The hardware is already there, someone just needs to mod/hack that in.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_vehicle_warning_sounds

In fact, it looks like we were going to get custom sound effects but the DOT killed it:

https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2022/07/13/2022-14733/federal-motor-vehicle-safety-standards-minimum-sound-requirements-for-hybrid-and-electric-vehicles

The agency has chosen not to adopt the remaining portions of the NPRM, including a proposal which would have allowed manufactures of hybrid and electric vehicles (HEVs) to install a number of driver-selectable pedestrian alert sounds in each HEV they manufacture.

My only major critiques for Discovery are that they walked back a Calvin-verse reboot after fan backlash (my interpretation), and that the theatrics usually don't mesh well with the action-oriented flow of the rest of the episodes around it.

The reboot thing was, to me, overly clear with the changes in aesthetics and technology. Especially the Klingons. And I get it: it's hard to dazzle audiences through vibrant creative direction, with decades of canon on your back. All that older stuff has compromises from old effects tech and budget baked in, so breaking from it is incredibly tempting. But the fans will not let you do this: just ask the Dr. Who production people. So we get some really oddball stuff happening in the first few seasons.

To the latter point, we get moments like: "The ship is going to explode in one minute, so let's argue for at least ten before we deal with that." This kind of thing happens a lot in Discovery and a binge-watch would have you thinking that the ship's counselor is either dead or contemplating transporter suicide. The dissent between characters feels valid most of the time, but other times is just jarringly out of character or contrary to self-preservation as to break suspension of disbelief. But there's usually angry, loud, arguing dissent. Which is a shame since these same episodes are hitting the mark on every other metric, IMO.

A huge chunk of the country is demoralized by all this. As trite as it sounds we absolutely need a pep rally, and some basic direction to go on. Right now there is a monstrous information and leadership vacuum, so anything would be preferable to that.

We should be prepared for a fight on that front. The current uproar is about trans women. Put a trans man in power (anywhere) and the shit is really going to hit the fan. The rhetoric will shift from pseudo-sexualized bathroom nonsense to "how dare you disrupt our patriarchy."

A gasoline engine sputtering down the road would draw far more attention than an electric motor, so people bought those.

They're still doing exactly this. ICE designs have never been quieter, but meanwhile Ford and GM are pumping out the L O U D E S T car options in decades.

Considering what roads were like at the time, and how far most people were from other things, 80 miles round-trip is plenty.

Heck, that's plenty nowadays for a lot of people.

Do you have a project page for this? I kinda need this in my life.

Edit: Found it.

https://youtu.be/-OA28r8Up5U?si=KSqT__CrqZE9zBbN

At first, I thought this was a cut-down four-track recorder (like a TASCAM with way fewer knobs) which would have been an amazing value for the time. It's still a beauty though.

They've distanced themselves from the optics, but not the principles. They think that by not flying swastikas everywhere that somehow that's different enough to pass.

There was a Sliders episode about a similar scenario. It really didn't go well for anyone with a Y-chromosome.

Ooh, a Boy Harsher reference in the wild. Nice.