TheVat

Then you are just a normal shy person. Once you share an activity or experience with someone this relaxes social inhibitions and you warm up. Returning brief eye contact sounds like a good first step for you, and your anxiety will diminish over time. I find many people are like emotional camels, crossing a desert of indifference. One pleasant contact, one shared smile, is an oasis and you can travel along for many miles on that. Perhaps you will encounter a @Peterkin on a bench - they sound nice. (unless they're a 300 pound Russian hacker on a bed in St Petersburg who has us all fooled)

In my experience of urban settings, it's okay to ignore passersby entirely. In rural settings, it's usual to just nod and say hello, but there's no obligation to go further than that (unless you have an actual question or observation) and if a couple or group is engaged in conversation then it's normal to just pass by and obey the social taboo against interrupting. In the northern plains of the US, there's a thing called "the Nebraska nod," (which is actually prevalent all through the northern plains states) which is just a quick nod plus brief eye contact, without vocalizing. It says I acknowledge you but in the least intrusive way possible . I have skipped the entire minefield of solitary pretty women. This requires careful steps if one is a gentleman who does not wish to stare or say things that could be construed as either flirtation or not respectful of boundaries. Women tend to exercise caution around random males (especially between ages 15 and 65) and boundaries should be respected. For example, if she's walking a dog, it's usually okay to comment on the dog ("What a handsome Weimaraner!") but not the woman ("you look just like [name of actress who is drop dead gorgeous]"). As for people who don't respond to a friendly hello, remember that says something about them and not about you. You aren't going to figure out a random stranger's boundaries and motivations, and it's really not worth your time.

If we weren't contemplating civilizational death over here, this would be pretty funny. My grandpa, who emigrated from Karlshamm, might have said, "din skitstövel."

I note that Popeye's, the US fried chicken chain, with a certain typographical cleverness, posted “pope yes”.

Carbon footprint slightly larger this afternoon in Vatican City. Habemus papam! Wonder what the fuel is, for the white smoke coming out of Sistine Chapel.

(from the Welker dementia ward visit interview last Sunday) WELKER: Would you rule out military force to take Canada? TRUMP: Well, I think we’re not going to ever get to that point. It could happen. Something could happen with Greenland. I’ll be honest, we need that for national and international security. WELKER: But not with Canada? TRUMP: It’s highly unlikely. I don’t see it with Canada. I just don’t see it, I have to be honest with you. WELKER: Okay, but you don’t rule it out for Greenland? TRUMP: I don’t rule it out. I don’t say I’m going to do it, but I don’t rule out anything. No, not there. We need Greenland very badly. Greenland is a very small amount of people, which we’ll take care of, and we’ll cherish them, and all of that. But we need that for international security.

Archimedes wept.

Just a small sample from the Welker interview... I’ll always talk about that. You know why? We subsidize Canada to the tune of $200 billion a year. We don’t need their cars. In fact, we don’t want their cars. We don’t need their energy. We don’t even want their energy. We have more than they do. We don’t want their lumber. We have great lumber. All I have to do is free it up from the environmental lunatics. We don’t need anything that they have. We’re giving them — I asked, I asked Mr. Trudeau — who I call Governor Trudeau, not Prime Minister, Governor — I said, “Governor Trudeau, could I ask you one question? Why are we giving you $200 billion? Why are we subsidizing Canada?” If Canada was a state it wouldn’t cost us. It would be great. It would be such a great — it would be a cherished state. And, if you look at our map, if you look at the geography — I’m a real estate guy at heart. When I look down at that without that artificial line that was drawn with a ruler many years ago — was just an artificial line, goes straight across. You don’t even realize. What a beautiful country it would be. It would be great. But, I don’t think the American public wants me to pay $200 billion a year to subsidize Canada. Again, remember this, we don’t need their cars, we don’t need their lumber, we don’t need their energy. We don’t need anything. We do very little business with Canada. They do all of their business practically with us. They need us. We don’t need them. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-administration/read-full-transcript-president-donald-trump-interviewed-meet-press-mod-rcna203514 "a genius"

He's certainly not in favor of trans substantiation.

Let's hope we don't leave or die off too suddenly. Given the maintenance and decommission requirements of nuclear reactors, warheads and spent fuel depositories, a sudden departure would be catastrophic. (and I'm not really factoring in the large tanks of toxic chemicals, piles of coal ash, and other goodies that will eventually spread death across the landscape)

His FR Evangelicals, conservative RCs, and the Dominionists seriously believe he is an instrument of God, sent to bring back a more theocratic society. They are under an umbrella called NAR (New Apostolic Reformation). And there are the Christian Nationalists, who are a little different in focus - they contend that America has always been a Christian nation - it's more about identity than religion, bound up in nativism and white supremacy. But they all seem to be converging on a Trump iconography AFAICT. How anyone would look to such a damaged, amoral and delusional pantsload as an object of religious reverence is...well, it's the mystery in many cults, eh?

What I've seen has looked two sided, with several members kind of piling on, so I would also request everyone involved just get back to topic in those threads. This is an example of something to just let go, and figure it's a misunderstanding. @exchemist was describing a potential state of mind of some patients who have anxiety about physical contact in a examination; he was not expressing it that way to be vulgar or denigrate health professionals. That would be a much smaller Web!

Ok. Well, I tend to see methodological differences between sciences as not being usually philosophical differences. Unless the method in play is one where researchers don't go after empirical data and just explore theoretical constructs and their implications. String theorists, maybe.

Not at all what I said. I agree with @CharonY .

But the OP may be looking for ways to engage with one. This is not a technical thread but rather one dedicated to engagement with those who may lack technical expertise. Several here have tried to clarify this for you.

Well, one answer to OP seems to be: refrain from judgmental comments or flaunting one's scientific purity while presenting a broad summation of climate research in a friendly and non-jargony manner.

I know that somewhat kindred fields can do different things with a dataset. A wildlife biologist could count cougar scat in order to derive a species census and use that for wilderness management. Meanwhile an ecologist focused on invertebrates might use that count in understanding how a trophic cascade from cougar scat will affect dung bettles and other interacting species (insectivore avians, e.g.) It's not likely however that a quite different field would use the data - a particle physicist wouldn't do much with that. Except step in it and then use colorful language. Pity. You did seem kinda rude.

People are so frequently turned into catfood. My aunt was eaten by neighborhood cats after she passed out in the garden from too much gin.

So go handle some cat poo and reap the benefits!

Not sure that immigrants causing the price surge in housing is factual. It could be one factor, but there were others, like covid and global supply chain problems, a deficit in housing units that had built up over years of under-building, labor issues etc. That immigrant=housing shortage narrative was certainly peddled here and demonstrably false. (here, in fact, migrant workers were helping alleviate a labor shortage among contractors) Agreed. What was so sad about 2024 was that some Independent voters (our largest voting bloc in fact) went and voted for Trump because they had been duped by propaganda that contained false allegations about Democrats. So they did actually make a shift based on policy, but unfortunately on false beliefs about said policies - the failure of legacy journalism continues to lay waste to American civic understanding)

I will eat a Vegemite sandwich in honor of the occasion. RW setbacks in France, Poland, Canada, and now Australia, a good trend and one furthered by MAGA, as others note.

Fair point. As Canadian comic Red Green observes, the hardest three words for men to say are "I don't know." To further complicate, I've heard that trucks account for 99% of road wear, so then you would have densely populated areas of Europe (more people per square km than US) where road wear is especially intense. Also, another confounding factor is that land is more expensive in Europe which increases highway construction cost. So: IDK. (hey...it's easier as an acronym) Whatever the relative cost per km, it makes sense to charge higher tax for gas if people have good alternatives to personal vehicles. It keeps transit attractive and reduces SCC (social cost of carbon) and makes cities more pedestrian friendly.

Sure seems like sexual selection would be part of the answer. Also, if a male has more lumber to lift this feat of hydraulics and so on would require good health and nutrition and therefore a prominent erection would be a display of overall good condition and likely fertility.

No, I I wasn't questioning they are higher over there. I was questioning your assertion that "the high price of gas in Europe is in large part due to taxes having nothing to do with the 'real' cost of the product." What I was trying to get at was that Europeans tend to drive less, but they still need all the infrastructure to get anyone from point A to point B. That means that a European driver is costing more per mile than an American driver. If Pierre Euro drives 25 miles a week and Joe Merica drives a 100, they still both need paved roads, signals, signage, bridges, etc. Pierre is going to cost society more per mile, and gas taxes should reflect that. Otherwise Henri who takes the Metro and Eloise who rides her bike will end up paying other kinds of taxes which are subsidizing Pierre in his carbon spewing travels. Well, I lean towards the idea that both carrot and stick are needed to bring about real change. If EVs and PIHVs are mandated at a certain level of production, then it helps if people are motivated to buy them by high gas prices. And the high taxes collected can also go into a program to assist lower income people who find it harder to transition away from an old gas hog they need for their job.

Not sure about that. When I was over there, it seemed like more people used mass transit which meant that the cost of serving up roads and other infrastructure to motorists might be higher per person. Higher price of gas could also serve to encourage continued production of fuel efficient vehicles and EVs, which is generally seen as a public good. Yep, which is why any real gas tax hike would need to be accompanied by better mass transit options and, for the pizza guy who needs his own vehicle, better reimbursement on his work mileage. A gas tax, isolated from real infrastructure improvement, is regressive.