One of my neighbors whoâ(TM)s in his eighties wound up switching to a recumbent tricycle because he had balance issues. Which sucked. But the tricycle is awesome and probably would be comfortable for you to sit on.

Nevertheless, you should ride what works and is enjoyable for you. The point is not to punish 80-year-olds by forcing them to ride bikes they arenâ(TM)t safe on. I have an Azore city bike that I really like. Wouldnâ(TM)t mind still being able to ride it at 80.

I live in Europe. It's definitely not a utopia (nor is it a single country!). However, I don't think that being more like the U.S. would make Europe better. That's my only point here. Yes, Europe could definitely be better (even the European country where I live!), but being more like the U.S. would make it worse. Certainly going in the direction of "growth first" would not make it better, although again I'm sure some percentage of those who emigrated to the U.S. would say this would be better.

The country I live in now is becoming more like the U.S. at the moment in the sense of starting to move toward home ownership as a growth asset. In the U.S., this has caused an insane housing shortage, and we're seeing that here too. We should be moving away from such policies, not toward them.

That's because if you get to 75 years old in the U.S. you are more likley to be reasonably well-off—if you aren't you are more likely die before that of preventable causes. And if you are well-off, that helps once you're past 75 as well. Of course plenty of poor people reach 75 in the U.S., but percentage-wise fewer do.

Also, the EU is a big place with lots of different countries. I live in the Netherlands, where you routinely see 80-year-olds riding bicycles. This is less common in other european countries, but that's changing. Your comparison would be more useful it if were by individual country rather than including the whole continent. I don't actually know if it's any different in the Netherlands—we have income inequality issues here too—but it would make sense if it were because people are so much more physically active here throughout life.

At this point a lot of economic growth is just generating garbage, but because we are so addicted to growth, we have to keep generating garbage.

A better question to ask would be, would you prefer to live in Europe or the U.S.? Not work, live. The idea that our lives should be work from graduation to grave doesn't really seem like something we ought to be valorizing—it sucks for the planet, and it sucks for us.

Reality check here: hybrid solar farming actually increases yields, because a lot of crops don't like direct sunlight all day.

Historically, consoles' launch prices were a premium that only enthusiasts accepted to pay. Afterwards, they would get price cuts. They had to, otherwise they would simply not sell beyond that niche.

The original PlayStation launched for $300, and after just four years it was selling for $100. The Nintendo 64 went from $200 to $100 in three years. And yet, the PlayStation 5 never got a price cut in five years, nor the Switch in eight years. You can't blame Orange Man Bad's recent tariffs for that.

The ultimate nerd brag: to have switched to Linux a week before Linus Torvalds first announced it.

YouTube incentivizes videos to be over 10 minutes. Consequently, videos are made longer than they have to be. Watching them in high speed just compensates a problem that YouTube created in the first place.

One can assume that the "never surrender" faction would have had greater influence, if there were no nukes to make obvious that their stance was suicidal.

Even after the bombings, when it was clear that Japan would be thoroughly fucked if they kept fighting, their ministry of war attempted a coup to prevent the surrender. So it is reasonable to assume that, without the nukes, Japan would have kept fighting, forcing a much bloodier land invasion.

So am I. And it enrages me.

The article does mention Unicomp.

https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fxkcd.com%2F937%2F

I think Clementine was my favorite, for it showed not just his imagination and humor, but his skill.

Hah! Look at this fool, he believes the moon is real!