Both are reincarnation isekai where the protagonist uses memories from her past life to her strategic advantage.
Crystal Trilogy
Vanilla_cabs
Karma: 677
Probably, and it’s not a bad assumption. I’d imagine that donation to charities would vary wildly between candidates. But it’s still an assumption, and his argument is not as airtight as he makes it appear.
May I add one downside? Vaccines are expensive and ultimately paid by the community.
I’ve heard on at least 3 different occasions people around me arguing that the unvaccinated were unconscious of how costly it would be if they ended up hospitalized. It upsets me that it never seems to dawn on them that vaccines are not free.
Even if the government has already bought the doses, taking one justifies that spending, and incentivizes them to buy more.
[...] the marginal difference between hiring you and hiring the next bioinformatician in line is (to us) negligible. Whether or not you (personally) choose to work for us will produce an insignificant net effect on our operations. The impact on your personal finances, however, will be significant. You could easily offset the marginal negative impact of working for us by donating a fraction of your surplus income to altruistic causes instead,”
Double standard: when considering the negative effect of her work, he compares her with the next in line, but when considering the positive effect of her donations, he doesn’t.
My personal experience agrees with the phases, but I’d triple all durations. Hunger is stronger for me the first 2 to 3 days. Then it’s smooth sailing. The fuzziness appears at the same time, 2 to 3 days.
Possibly, but I doubt the same can be said for the net hedon loss. The great-uncle who died of COVID may have been quite old, but he still probably had a few years ahead of himIn terms of hedons, many old people live in retirement homes under horrendous conditions. Some lose their marbles, I remember one who every day tried to escape while claiming “I have to take care of my goats!” Some forget that their loved ones are dead, only to relearn it and be sad again. Some have chronic pains. Some shit themselves because they can’t control their sphincters anymore, then stay in their shit for hours while waiting for the single nurse who has 10 other residents to treat before them because the house is criminally understaffed. Their only joy besides the family’s monthly visit is to eat shitty food and watch shitty TV. No, believe me, nobody would spend extra to provide better food for an elderly who might have lost their sense of taste and has no leverage anyway.
There is something like negative hedons. There are things worse than death. Can we be real? The average year of an elderly doesn’t have nearly as many hedons as the average year of a young adult.
babies are likely more resilient than we think and this loss will be temporary
What makes you think so? My prior is that ‘babies are more resilient than we think’ is a fashionable idea because the opposite would be tantamount to blaming parents, especially poor ones, and that’s unfashionable. I’m interested in learning more about the topic.
I think he means that your argument:
When it’s not socially acceptable to have a frank discussion of the real costs and benefits of various restrictions, it becomes easier for people who oppose the restrictions to pretend that the benefits of the restrictions don’t exist (aka the disease isn’t real or isn’t serious).
also applies this way:
When it’s not socially acceptable to have a frank discussion of the real costs and benefits of various restrictions, it becomes easier for people who support the restrictions to pretend that the costs of the restrictions don’t exist (aka that restrictions to freedom aren’t real or serious).
I think both are great points that complete each other.
Somehow you managed to transcribe my experience almost exactly.
I probably got Covid in March 2020, despite being more careful about it than most people around me. It was almost inevitable due to the place I lived. My symptoms were even milder than the ones you describe, I didn’t lose the sense of smell or taste. When I called the doctors, I was told to stay home unless (or until) I was in need for hospitalization.
Now we’re 2 years in. Nobody in my Dunbar-sized group died or needed hospitalization due to Covid. The overwhelming majority of the impact of the Covid crisis on our life are due to the restrictions (note: I live in France.) My plans for finding a job abroad were seriously disrupted. I am sufferering from a health condition that requires medication, that is very likely (I’d say 90%) caused by the stress of living under ever growing, unpredictable restrictions. I still plan to move abroad when the occasion shows up, but every 3 months that pass it seems to become more complicated to cross borders.
For my group, the direct effects of the Covid are a rounding error compared with the effects of the restrictions.
That might be, but I could find points for the opposite as easily. After all, we are expecting the child to help save the world. If a child is to become someone of exceptional importance, then probably some sort of special treatment can help tutor them into that role. Take the Dalai Lama: he’s raised into his role since birth.
There’s a thin middle ground between imposing your values and meanings on another culture’s customs, and thinking a culture hold all the keys on interpreting their own customs (positively, of course). There is as much disregard for reality in both cases. For an obvious example of the latter in Semyonova’s report, the babies who were euthanised soon after birth failed to get any benefit from their culture. Where is their happiness?
I agree that we should start by acknoweledging the complexity of human cultures. But we shouldn’t stop there. We shouldn’t use “complexity” as a thought-terminating cliché. Not that I accuse you of doing so, but I wanted to make that point clear.
When I was younger I was quite interested by Lloyd deMause’s psychohistory, a fringe theory of history that draws causal connections from chilrearing to culture. Regardless of the theory, in those works you can find chilling accounts of child mistreatment in various cultures, among which this one would fit right in.
My bad, I rewatched the documentary and it’s actually less clear. The two swiss labs Novartis and Roche, who respectively commercialize Lucentis and Avastin in Europe (undistinguishable treatments both created by Genetech, an American lab bought back by Roche—also, Novartis owns 33.33% of Roche), tried a legal action against France. I assume it was to outlaw the use of Avastin in the eyes. But it eventually failed. However, in the meantime, the habit had taken root to use Lucentis to cure AMD. It’s not explained exactly why. The interviewed person says “the difficulty nowadays for the healthcare system, is that they set up a system that is so complex for eye doctors to manage that in the end, everyone gave up.” I interpret that as “it’s possible, but there’s so much red tape that it’s impractical”. I will correct my original comment.
I find it misleading to call drugs tools. It is not uncommon to find unexpected uses for drugs.
Here is an example I just saw in a documentary last week:
Avastin, a treatment for certain types of cancer, was found out to cure AMD very cost-efficiently. Novartis was so miffed that they successfully lobbied for forbidding using Avastin in AMD cases, then they repackaged it into Lucentis and now they sell it at 40 times Avastin’s price. It’s the same product, but doctors are forbidden to use the cancer treatment to cure people’s eyes. (Correction: Novartis and Roche tried to have the use of Avastin in AMD cases outlawed in France, but failed. Still, doctors are discouraged from doing that by the complexity of administrative procedures, and presently the overwhelming majority of case are treated with Lucentis.)
Likewise, Pfizer and Merck and all the rest of these big pharmaceutical companies designed their vaccines and drugs to fight COVID-19, and gathered lots of flagship-quality evidence to bolster their claimed success. Nobody with serious standing challenges these claims.
If they are so confident that their vaccines are stellar successes, why did they specify in their contracts with European governments that they could not be held liable for side effects?
I find it misleading that what Caplan calls “variations in parenting” would actually mean “switching from a high stress/ high pressure version of normal middle class parenting to a low stress version of normal middle class parenting”. You oppose that very limited definition on the one hand, and “extreme changes in how the child is treated” on the other hand, but there are many third options. Homeschooling, for example. Or raising a child in the countryside as opposed to a crowded city. I have nothing against the limited version of Caplan’s argument, but I’m concerned readers might be misled into updating towards a bigger version of the argument.
Well now I’m confused.
I’m not convinced there was/is a preference for tearing down ugly buildings rather than pretty ones in Europe. A lot of buildings were torn down during the 2 World Wars and many other wars before, and combatants don’t choose their targets based on aesthetic preferences.
Also, keeping old buildings pretty requires special effort and expense. Old buildings age, due to erosion, vegetal invasion (you wouldn’t believe what damage plants are capable of doing), temperature change (especially when water infiltrated in the joints freezes), pollution, vandalism, terrain instability, etc. Europe has pretty old buildings because it cares about and is willing to invest in pretty old buildings, it’s not something that falls into your lap after a dozen centuries.
My understanding is that old cars were made of stronger materials that deform less on impact. As a result, it was the content of the car who deformed on impact. The new cars are made less resistant so that the users have better chances to survive an impact. This is a definite progress (and a good excuse for making non-durable cars). In 1999 the new trend was already started. Try a 1960′ or 1980′ car.
I don’t think the reason for planned obsolescence is that it saves expenses designing products this way. Sometimes, they design appliance so that a small part breaks after a specific time (not too long after the warranty expires). This requires special effort.
I think the problem, for the manufacturer, of making durable products is that you’re succeeding your way out of business. If consumer’s needs are met for the decades to come, then there’s no need to make more products. We live in an economy were it’s not products that are made to meet consumer’s needs, but consumer’s needs that are shaped (through marketing) to meet production. That’s the definition of a consumer society I was taught: growth is driven by consumption.
I don’t think that a fair assessment of what they said. They cite their years as evidence that they witnessed multiple doomsday predictions that turned out wrong. That’s a fine point.