> The far more sensible way to view things when living in an infinite thermal bath of energy separated from absolute zero by a high value resistance is exergy defined as the available energy to do useful work.

We do not live in an infinite thermal bath of energy. It is, in fact, very very finite.

Exergy is based on the environment; Specifically, if you take some environment and bring the energy to equilibrium. This will be important in a bit, because you say a very dumb thing...

> Say the Carnot efficiency was maximized at 100C over room temperature of 300k, that would be 25% or 1-(300/400) because it penalizes you for the heat you got for free, the 300C

And there is the dumb thing.

You definitionally can not use any of the energy at 300C because that's your rejection temperature. You're not "using 100% of the heat energy you paid for" not only because you did not pay for the ambient heat, you have no mechanism in this scenario to move it to a lower temperature reservoir (and extract work from it) because it's already the lowest temperature in your system - by definition.

So yeah I guess "If you change the reality of the situation you can get different results" is technically true, but means nothing. You threw out the word 'exergy' (as if it was wholly unrelated to Carnot efficiency?!) and then quietly completely changed the parameters of the problem to do some bogus math. Exergy is about bringing a system's environment to equilibrium, and you tried to redefine the environment from a realistic and practical "Earth's surface" to a hypothetical "The entire universe."

> The earth has about 400k volts stored between its upper atmosphere and the ground where we live, with a net charge against true neutral of only a few volts making the surface voltage 200,000 or so. Your absolute electric car efficiency therefore goes from 200,800 volts to 200,000 volts never using the remaining potential to true neutrality.

For someone who claims to have a master's degree in mechanical engineering, I'd hope you'd have a better understanding that the Carnot Theorem only applies to heat engines and thermal gradients, not electromagnetic gradients.

Understanding that all voltages are relative, and that it makes no sense to use the average voltage between the ionosphere and the Earth's surface when evaluating anything other than discussing the voltage between the ionosphere and the Earths surface, is also something one should expect from someone with an advanced engineering degree.

> But thatâ(TM)s stupid because the current never flows to true neutral and canâ(TM)t flow to true neutral because of the giant resistor in the sky

It's stupid because even if it could flow from whatever the fuck "True neutral" is supposed to mean (midway point that is arbitrarily significant?), you're still dealing with a gradient that's tens of miles long but your car is only several feet high. Even if you created a conductive path to discharge the ionophere through your car, you'd still only get a fraction of a volt.

None of that is relevant here though, because you' don't use Carnot efficiency to describe something not operating with the flow of heat energy.

> So saying a thermodynamic process is effectively described in absolute terms by Carnot is just as silly as saying electric cars are less than 1% efficient.

Well no, because Carnot efficiency is a well established principle of thermodynamics - a direct consequence of the second law - that actually works in both theory and practice, and the electric car thing is some delusional bullshit you came up with. Big difference.
=Smidge=

> Porches aren't really daily driver cars
> Cayenne, Macan, Panamera, Taycan, 911, and the 718 Cayman and Boxster.

Four of the seven models listed are literally marketed as "daily drivers" and/or family cars.
=Smidge=

> Under the proposed changes, I'll pay per mile. 50 miles per gallon means I'm driving about 42.5 miles a day. So 42.5 miles * $.027 = $1.1475 tax a day. $1.1475 * 365 = $418.8375 a year. So for bothering to drive a hybrid (how dare I!!!) I'll go from $189.873 up to $418.837. $419 / 190 = 221% increase in gas tax.

Meanwhile you're not paying for roughly $2400/yr in gasoline. If you were driving a gasoline vehicle at a typical 30mpg, your 42.5 miles per day would burn about 1.42 gallons which, at a statewide average cost of $4.569/gal, is $6.47 per day, or $2362.55 per year.

Your annual fuel cost savings decreases from $2172.68 to $1943.71.

So did your have a point or are you just bitter your free ride might be slowing down a tiny bit?

> The asshole in the 20mpg tank won't notice a difference

The asshole getting 20mpg is already paying almost ten times what you would be under the proposed tax at $0.228/mi at current state average gas prices, and I disagree that they won't notice that jump ~12%.

> YAY I'm so happy to be green

I should hope so with an extra 2 grand in your pocket every year over the alternative. Also FYI those higher registration fees are there to make up for the gasoline prices you're already not paying, which is nearly double the tax you'd be paying at the pump otherwise.

"They dropped the cover charge and made admittance to the bar free! How DARE they charge more for drinks!"
=Smidge=
/AND you probably claimed a tax credit buying that vehicle...

> why vehicle weight doesn't get mentioned in their idea

It's because the difference between 3000 and 4000 lbs is practically negligible. Yeah it's a 4th power relationship, but 3000 to 4000 lbs is about 3x the wear rate and 3 multiplied by practically nothing is still practically nothing.

Not to say I'm against including weight as part of the tax calculation, because it would incentivize people using smaller vehicles which helps in a lot of other ways.
=Smidge=

> These programs work well in intensely impoverished areas

[Citation needed]

I'm not saying you're wrong, or even that I disagree; But the catch here is that the places where this program presumably has the biggest impact are also the places where little to no data is available.

But also, if the OLPC are actually existing and being used... they have network connectivity. Presumably they need some form of internet to "give access to information that otherwise just wouldn't be there" if only intermittently or by proxy, which in turn should provide a way to collect usage statistics and/or track students in these hard to survey populations.

Either way you can't claim they work well in any population without actual data or reports to support that claim.
=Smidge=

Arduino responded to this recent drama just a few days ago, saying "Our 20-year commitment to open-source is unwavering" with a good explanation of the new T&C.

https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fblog.arduino.cc%2F2025%2F1...

I believe Arduino is sincere with their statement.

One man speaking with Adafruit's social media accounts seems to feel otherwise. He probably believes he's doing good by raising the alarm. Maybe some of the points have some merit? But the tone really looks like an attempt to stir up drama and harm Arduino's reputation.

Adafruit does have history with Arduino. In 2015 when Arduino had serious internal division and conflict, Adafruit was manufacturing brand name Arduino Uno under some sort of license deal. That arrangement ended sometime in 2016. Adafruit quickly launched a product line of essentially Arduino clone boards named "Metro". Does any of that matter? Maybe, maybe not. But when reading what really looks like an attack on Arduino's long-established reputation coming from official Adafruit channels, best to keep in mind those 2 companies have a history.

I also have some history with Arduino, having made an Arduino-compatible board and contributed code and help over the years. I've personally met the Arduino developers and Arduino leadership folks several times at conferences. They are genuinely good people who've poured a lot of effort into trying to good in the world.

Maybe Arduino change for the better or for the worse with Qualcomm. I don't have a crystal ball. But I'm trying to keep an open mind and not get caught up in fear over basically boilerplate legalese.

> Did the advisor not check the student's work?

The student made up the data, claiming if came from a legitimate source. Other than independently trying to get that same data from the same source and verifying it, how exactly do you 'check the work?'

The review is typically focused on how the data is processed and if the conclusions follow logically from the data presented. If you just make shit up at the very start it can be very difficult to catch or prove short of completely redoing the study - which is in fact how a most fraud is caught, when someone tries to replicate a study's results and fails.
=Smidge=

This should be a career-ending move. Demonstrating this level of dishonesty should bar him from holding a graduate degree of any kind, really, let alone anything in scientific research.

Increasing and enforcing standards is needed, but also higher standards mean nothing if there are no consequences. Make it clear that this kind of nonsense will obliterate your academic career.
=Smidge=

They don't have the authority to arbitrarily decide where to put fracking wells either. Or mines, or oil rigs, or chemical factories...

In fact they technically get permits to do basically everything everything they do. Or at least that used to be the case when the EPA actually meant something. Never stopped them from completely fucking everything up to save money though, did it? And I bet you know it.

I guarantee that if any of these get built and fails, the way the public finds out about it is someone noticing a spike in cancer rates.
=Smidge=

I, for one, have complete confidence in corporate industry's ability and willingness to respect the environment and the safety of the general public.

=Smidge= /s

> Have grade-separated tracks that go above or below the roads.

Easier said than done.

Grade for typical trains is something like 2% or less, so raising a railway high enough to get over a roadway needs almost a quarter mile of track on either side minimum, so for a single rail bridge you just created at a half mile of impassible wall and cut a whole neighborhood in half. Automotive roads are better but still limited in a similar way. maybe triple the grade/a third the distance but you're still making a huge barrier.

So if you need to get through a town without having grade crossings you're basically stuck building the *entire* thing 14+ feet in the air, including the stations, which is outlandishly expensive both to build and to maintain.
=Smidge=

> but how much does it really happen?

A lot. Like, a LOT a lot.

Maybe you would like some other videos if that's your preferred media?

Roblox Situation is Worse Than You Think
Roblox: How to Destroy Your $83,000,000,000 Company Overnight - A Deep Dive
Roblox, Take a Seat (ft: Chris Hansen)

Roblox has had problems with child exploitation too, for years now; Investigation: How Roblox Is Exploiting Young Game Developers and their follow-up, Roblox Pressured Us to Delete Our Video. So We Dug Deeper.
=Smidge=

You are discussing - ranting about, really - what should be.

The rest of us are discussing what is.

The original claim is that people aren't buying the F-150 Lightning because (paraphrasing) people want mid-size trucks and not fill-size trucks. That claim is refuted by pointing out that mid-size trucks already exist, they do not sell very well, and in fact full-size trucks are overwhelmingly popular.

Now you come in with your righteous indignation that because, in your view, people don't actually make full use of full-size trucks, they should not be buying full-size trucks. Notwithstanding that the majority of these trucks actually ARE used as trucks - because the cultural bubble that exists entirely up your ass along with your head is not representative of the entire world - the very real popularity of these vehicles is not dependent on what people actually do with them.

I'll say it again just to be crystal clear: It does not matter if you think they should not be popular, the fact is they are popular. Reality does not give a shit what your opinion is.
=Smidge=

Whether or not people use the vehicles for their supposed purpose or to the full capabilities is completely irrelevant to the sales numbers.

I'm sorry that the world does not conform to what you imagine it should be. The reality is full size pickup trucks are the best selling vehicle type in the US by a wide margin. Feel free to masturbate your is-ought sophistry until you go blind though...
=Smidge=

That's probably because the "Typical millionaire in the US" is likely a farmer or rancher.

=Smidge=