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Showing content with the highest reputation on 02/29/24 in all areas

  1. “what makes this fee revolutionary is that it will apply to emissions that don’t happen on European soil. The EU already puts a price on many of the emissions created by European firms; now, through the new Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, or CBAM, the bloc will charge companies that import the targeted products — cement, aluminum, electricity, fertilizer, hydrogen, iron and steel — into the EU, no matter where in the world those products are made.” https://knowablemagazine.org/content/article/food-environment/2024/big-boost-europe-carbon-neutral-goals-cbam This removes incentives to move carbon-intensive industry out of the EU, since that won’t sidestep tariffs any longer. The tariff accounting includes the electricity used for production, so there’s an incentive for business exporting to the EU to use green energy
    3 points
  2. I would not characterise it as hubris but I am afraid I do think we are witnessing the end of US dominance of geopolitics, as a result of the possibly terminal dysfunction of its politics. One sees every day authoritarians, in Russia, China and even now Israel, becoming ever bolder, as they see the US weaken. The EU is finding itself suddenly exposed by its tacit and complacent reliance on the US to uphold the rules-based order that has largely held sway since the end of the war. The Chinese are gearing up to retake Taiwan and appropriate the South China Sea. Putin knows if he can hold on for a Trump presidency, he will be assured of success in Ukraine and can turn his sights towards the Baltic States and the Kaliningrad exclave. Israel has embarked on a Final Solution to the Gaza problem, via blatant ethnic cleansing and what looks increasingly like genocide, while the US is impotent to stop it. There is every sign that the US Republican party has withdrawn support for the democratic system, taking a large chunk of the electorate along with them, and instead embraced a loathsome personality cult. The USA will be lucky if its judicial system, its free media and its term limits on presidents survive. The country will be consumed with its own internal problems for the next few years at least. Xi, Putin and others will be rubbing their hands at the prospect. So much for "making America great again".
    2 points
  3. Sure, it makes perfect sense. One wants maximum resonance from the body of the instrument. I would presume the use of drying oils, such as linseed oil, would help repel the moisture from sweat. Which reminds me of that joke in the Molesworth books about the boy not paying attention in a biology class about hibernation: Master: "Molesworh, what are you doing? Pay attention. Now, what does a bat do in winter? Molesworth: "Er....er.......It splits if you don't oil it Sir."
    1 point
  4. That fits, certainly. I suspect this product is the resin already fully polymerised, i.e. the curing step was done during manufacture. But let's see if the OP comes back and comments.
    1 point
  5. A couple of thoughts here. There is vigorous debate regarding the power system in the world, and while the US is still a super power, but it is not clear whether we are still in a unipolar world. Many scholars have argued that we are either moving or already are in a multipolar world where international power is far more fractured. I understand that this is not the gist of your question, but I think is relevant context. It is also relevant to note that not only military is relevant, but increasingly access to critical resources, economic power and economic connections. Strong economic interdependency can be a powerful weapon, too, for example. A big issue in the statement is the level-headed democracy aspect. While the US has a special outspoken brand of crazy, Europe for example has similar questions, all connected to populism and mostly right-wing populism right now. In general, populistic streaks have always been a danger to democracies, as they promise easy and quick fixes to real or perceived grievances. However, as part of their anti-establishment appeal, they often popularize circumvention of procedure, frequently scapegoat vulnerable (especially non-voting) groups and are at least friendly with authoritarian ideas. We have seen how vulnerable populations are whenever something happens leading to arguably self-destructive behaviour (e.g. Brexit). Even worse, it does not really seem that negative consequences borne out of this sentiments are necessarily penalized. Even after the rather egregious attempt by the far right to dismantle democracy, the party still obtained the plurality of votes (but lost the majority). Some called it a win for democracy, but really it is more a near miss. Likewise, in Germany the far right party is likely to become second-strongest party and even after the meeting of some of their leadership with (other) self-confessed nazis, regarding the deportation of immigrants and other desirables (Wannsee, anyone), they are only dropping a little bit in polls (which should be unthinkable, given Germany's past). Anyway, the gist of it is that it is difficult to find an strong coalition of enough level-headed democracies, level-headedness goes out of the window the moment folks feel somewhat threatened (and I am almost certain that during uncertain economic times, folks will feel more threatened by e.g. immigrants than, say, Russia). But maybe I am just getting increasingly disillusioned.
    1 point
  6. And this is the mistake many folks make when trying to interpret complex issues by using single words to define them. I know a LOT of people who think the way you do, that "liberal" means "anything goes" and conservative means "responsible". I also know a LOT of people who think conservative means "fearful" and "ignorant" and "stuck in the mud", while liberal means "progressive" and "hopeful" and "forward-thinking". This is the problem with using these terms with each other. It's hard to know how a person has been influenced when they use such broad terms. I'm not sure hubris is the problem in the US. In trying to focus on capitalism to the exclusion of any other ownership principles, we're allowing our leadership to pretend to care about us when their re-elections are really up to big corporations. We may find it hard to give up what we think we've earned, but I don't think it's out of pride. If the American public had any pride at all we'd gather to stop these stains on humanity from exploiting us even further (the CEO of Kellogg's recently claimed that if we're worried about the high price of food, we should eat Frosted Flakes for dinner). We make very little investment in The People. Everything goes to keep big corporations in business, including bailing them out with tax dollars when they mess up. I think we should focus on better social spending and representing the will of The People, and maybe then we can better assess whether this is a matter of hubris or not.
    1 point
  7. Yes, you're right. The unusual writing of the Lagrangian set me off. Sorry. That is indeed the way to generalise to higher-order derivatives. I've proven it many times, but now I had just a couple of minutes and I screwed up. There's just a coefficient difference. Later.
    1 point
  8. Unfortunately, I can't read this post: and I don't know how his result is different from mine, but it seems that his EL equation is the same as mine, <<<<< which is different from <<<<<<< I disagree with the latter. We need to use the generalized EL equation, which I have already derived in this exercise: and got the answer compatible with this: (Euler–Lagrange equation - Wikipedia)
    1 point
  9. This is not my area of expertise either, but looking on line, it seems to be an already cured resin, for dissolving in a solvent as a varnish, or as a component in paint formulations etc. I thought this site was interesting: https://www.insituconservation.com/en/products/synthetic_resins/laropal_A81. They seem to recommend it as a varnish for conservation of paintings. I can't imagine they would want to add acid curing agents for such purposes. So my guess would be you just dissolve it in a suitable polar organic solvent, apply it and let the solvent evaporate. But that site, in Greece, has a contact page so you might consider asking them if you need a curing agent or whether you just dissolve it and if so what solvent they recommend.
    1 point
  10. It’s not America per se, but the right wing. And when the US is no longer dominant, it’s China who will take over. Be careful what you wish for.
    1 point
  11. Why do I need to know? You could have simply ignored my comment or address my supposed misunderstanding of liberals.
    -1 points
  12. All the vaccine does is make you die, you should refuse thus. The solution is to remove pollution from us. Global warming causes trillions of dollars of physical damages, and traffic noise worsens spread of COVID (which causes trillions of dollars of healthcare costs,) how long for our leaders to realize the solutions for air traffic is: outlaw, and for land vehicles: subsidizes to switch to fuelless? Proof that traffic worsens spread of COVID, from our scientist leaders: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8499730/ Proof that COVID causes trillions of dollars of damages: https://healthpolicy.usc.edu/article/covid-19s-total-cost-to-the-economy-in-us-will-reach-14-trillion-by-end-of-2023-new-research/ Proof that global warming causes trillions of dollars of damages: https://climateanalytics.org/publications/carbon-majors-trillion-dollar-damages https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03573-z The cost of supercapacitors/ultracapacitors was the purpose that fuelless vehicles had huge prices. Solar offers abundant power sources for supercapaciters/ultracapaciters. Scientists now have methods to produce anodes/cathodes from trash (the rest of the capaciter is just carbun, the most abundant of natural resources): https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-981-99-9931-6_16 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0016236122039497 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-01319-w
    -4 points
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