For driving pleasure would you rather drive a throaty V-8 muscle car rumbling down the road or an EV?

Having driven both, I'll take the EV. For starters, EVs accelerate faster. The fastest production car on the market right now is the Tesla Model S Plaid (1.99 seconds 0-60 with rollout subtracted). No ICE car can match it no matter how many cylinders it has. But Tesla is not alone is break-neck acceleration. The Rivian R1T is a pickup truck that does 0-60mph in 3 seconds. But OK, I don't have Model S money (just as I don't have Ferrari money). Even your more pedestrian EV's like the Model 3/Y Long Range (not the performance versions) can do a very quick 4.5 seconds. Not only that, but that super addicting push you into the seat torque is available instantly at any speed and under any condition. You don't have to be in the right gear at the right RPMs to feel it. It's always there. I have both a Model Y and a BMW M235i 6MT. One would think the BMW is the more fun car. 320 HP, manual transmission, small, light-ish. It's a blast on the back roads and no slouch in a straight line. It's on paper 0-60 is about the same as the Tesla. However, in the real world, if I'm looking for that sudden punch of power, I don't always get it from the BMW. I'll get it launching from a standstill. I might get it in a low gear if the RPMs are already high. But otherwise, I'm not getting the full g-force potential the car is capable of. Don't get me wrong, there is plenty of power for confidently passing at highways speeds, but no one is going to spill their coffee. The Model Y, on the other hand, you always get that maximum g potential. You could be going 80mph on the highway. If you mash the accelerator, everyone in the car will be thrown into their seats and have butterflies in their stomachs. I enjoy both cars immensely, but the internal combustion engine is slowly losing its charm.

You get over the lack of sound. Loud engines start to sound quaint. All that noise and still slower than a family crossover. People's associations with what "fast" or "powerful" sounds like will change. In time, the faint whine of an eclectic motor, with its sci-fi spaceship sound will be what gearheads crave. It's like the difference between propeller driven planes and jets. At one time, the roar of a WWII piston driven fighter like a P51 or Spitfire were the epitome of power and speed. Now it's an F/A-18 breaking the sound barrier in a flyby over your favorite sporting event.

I did. Read some the general critics consensus afterwards and pretty much agreed. The movie seems like a parody of every recent adventure movie where Captain Jack Sparrow attempts to steal the constitution from the Nazis before the bank can foreclose on his childhood home. That's not to say that the movie wasn't entertaining. It was fine. Younger audiences would enjoy it, but there are much better executed movies in the genre. The pacing is a little off, the CGI is just so-so, and you are asked to suspend disbelief just a little too much. If you read about the production of the movie, you wouldn't be surprised. Based on a popular video game series, went through rewrite after rewrite, passed between half the directors in Hollywood for years between finally getting made (and with Covid also throwing a wrench in the mix). Considering I watched it at home on Netflix, the ticket price was worth it, but I'm glad I hadn't paid to see it in a theater.

Everyone on here is complaining about how every movie is trying to push an agenda. This is not one of them, unless you think "don't give up" and "don't let greed cloud your judgment" are too divisive in this day and age.

I also hear people on here complaining that critics are out of touch and snobby. That may be true to many, but there are also many who understand who a movie is intended for and measure it's quality based on its intended audience. Roger Ebert ascribed to this. And in the case of this movie, those good critics have seen them all. They know what a good version of the adventure film targeted to ages 13 - 30 is. They just happen to not think Uncharted is one of them.

Elderly drivers? In NYC? If you have lived long enough to be considered elderly, you should have the intelligence and sense of self-preservation to not drive in NYC. There's probably a few out there, but they would certainly not be counted as the "pansy-ass drivers". You can be sure that if you get in the way of 80-year old Ethel Goldstein's Lincoln, you will receive a mix of horn blaring, F-bombs and middle fingers. The "pansy-ass drivers" are the tourists who were dumb enough to drive into the city and not immediately park at the Port Authority and spend the rest of their time in the city on foot, subway or taxi. You can also find them frantically asking passersby the quickest way out of there. They won't make the same mistake again.

All joking aside, Manhattan is easily the most challenging and chaotic driving experience in the United States. I've been behind the wheel in many cities across the country and nothing comes close. Yes, the drivers are aggressive. The pedestrians are plentiful and aggressive. The lines on the street are merely a suggestion. There may be two lanes painted, but there's a truck unloading in one of them and a taxi dropping off a passenger in the other. It's all about situational awareness and going with the flow of what's around you rather than following any written traffic rules. If Waymo can work there, they can work anywhere.

Health has been a focus of some GMO plants. "Golden Rice" is probably the best example. From Wikipedia:

Golden rice is a variety of rice (Oryza sativa) produced through genetic engineering to biosynthesize beta-carotene, a precursor of vitamin A, in the edible parts of rice.[1][2] It is intended to produce a fortified food to be grown and consumed in areas with a shortage of dietary vitamin A. Vitamin A deficiency causes xerophthalmia, a range of eye conditions from night blindness to more severe clinical outcomes such as keratomalacia and corneal scars, and permanent blindness. It also increases risk of mortality from measles and diarrhea in children.

I would not be surprised if there are modifications that could be made to animals that could boost certain vitamins when consumed, or reduce the harm of eating them in some way (e.g. reduce heart disease). However, I have a feeling increasing output (bigger, grow faster like AquaVantage Salmon) and decreasing environmental impact will be the primary targets.

This. So much this. Not just to build credit for when you really need it, but because it is very often financially advantageous to borrow instead of pay cash. If the interest rate is lower than the return you could reasonably expect on an investment (e.g. Index mutual fund), then you should finance the purchase and invest your cash. This is generally true for mortgages and auto loans, but will vary depending on your credit history/score. Bad credit or no history, will not get you favorable rates (if approved at all). I made this mistake buying my first car after college. I was given the (poor) advice from someone who is otherwise financially savvy that not having any debt at all would be seen as more favorable when applying for a future loan. So I sold an investment to pay cash for my car. Fast forward to when I wanted to apply for a financing option (0% interest for 12 months and I otherwise had the cash). Even for a relatively small amount, I was denied because of lack of history. My one credit card with a low limit was not enough for this lender to judge my worthiness. Plus, on top of that, had I kept the money invested during that time, I would have come out much further ahead financially. Same thing happened to a friend who had a very well paying job and saved most of his money into his 30's. He also had never financed a car and didn't even use credit cards (debit only) because he was always told "debt is bad". Knowing his financial situation and his character, he should have been approved no problem, but a bank sees no history, so he was denied for a reasonable auto loan. As long as you have the means to pay back the loan, there is nothing wrong with borrowing, in fact it is the financially wise thing to do.

BNPL, on the other hand, seems to be a different conversation. I can see how one might be able to use a BNPL to maximize the work their money is able to do (e.g. keep cash in interest bearing savings for longer), but the short term nature of these loans (and the pitiful APR on savings accounts these days) gives you very little benefit for the work you'd have to put in. I'm sure there's some guy out there who has been able to successfully do a BNPL hack, just like extreme couponers or credit card points hackers, but it's probably a lot of work. I am also concerned with how these are marketed. In the only Klarna ad I've seen, Maya Rudolph wants to buy some new boots. Yeesh. In this scenario, if you can't pay for the boots right now, or by the end of the month on your credit card, then you shouldn't buy the boots. I'm sure there are some legit use cases out there, though. Can you do this with medical expenses? Home repairs? Basically, unexpected things that come up where you HAVE to pay for, but the seller does not have very flexible terms. But I guess that wouldn't be as profitable as telling the recent college grad that yes they can buy that unnecessary new shiny object.

You haven't exactly explained why you won't subscribe to Disney+, though. Or why distributing through Hulu or Netflix would be better for everyone (or do you mean better for exisitng Hulu and Netflix subscribers?) If it's because you don't like the idea of the content owner also being the distributer, then you shouldn't be subscribing to Hulu or Netflix either. Both produce and distribute their own content. And so does Amazon and HBO/HBO Max. The most popular Netlfix shows tend to be the ones they produced themselves. What if Disney decided that the Mandalorian was going to be a Disney Channel (the cable channel) exclusive? Prior to Disney+ they did that all the time. Sure, you could choose to get Disney Channel via the local cable provider or via a satellite provider, but if you want to watch that Disney owned show, you had to pay someone for access to the Disney owned channel. In fact when I was a kid it was a "premium" channel you had to pay extra for, just like HBO.

It seems to me that you just don't want to subscribe to yet another streaming service. Which I totally understand. But unless Disney+ is not offered where you live ("I am not a Disney+ subscriber. This is a conscious choice"), I wouldn't exactly call that a supply problem. Sounds more like a demand problem. The supply is there, you just don't demand it enough to pay the asking price. As for DVD release, sure they may get some additional cash from DVD's, but that's not the business they are interested in. If you won't sign up for a Disney+ subscription, then Disney actually isn't interested in your money. In fact, catering to Voyager529's specific needs might even lose them money. The Mandalorian is clearly the flagship content for Disney+. It was created solely for the purpose of getting more people to subscribe. The "Disney back-catalogue" audience only gets you so many subscribers. The "I need a constant stream of fresh Star Wars content" audience is the real gold mine.

I'm really not surprised that kids don't see the value of CS, especially when these programs seem to be pushing kids towards a career in CS, rather than just a practical understanding. Kids never see the long term value of anything. My kid doesn't see the value of just plain math! She keeps asking whether certain professions require math (she's 8 and my usual answer is, "if you want to get paid for your work, you need to know how to count your money."). But I think the goal of these programs of creating more programmers is not really what we need. I would much prefer that everyone has some exposure to how all of the software around us functions at a basic level, and be able to identify when something could be automated. They don't need to be able to write the code themselves, because they can find a programmer to do it for them. Those without any exposure, tend to try to brute force things manually and waste a lot of time, when a quick Excel formula could have completed the task in minutes. If they are exposed, they at least know to ask. I see the same value with getting an exposure to databases and SQL. The basics can help one recognize what kind of report/data they want and express it in a very clear manner to someone who is an expert. After getting exposure myself, I tend to ask for data in sort a sort of pseudo-SQL that an expert would instantly recognize (I would like you to select all of the records from the contacts table where [some criteria] is true. Also, please group it by state and sort alphabetically by last name).

So I guess my advice is, keep exposing kids to this stuff. It is useful to them, even if they don't realize it right now. But don't expect many to become programmers. You certainly will pick up a few more programmers than if you didn't do anything, but the real value is that we have a more well rounded and software literate population.

Well you're not, at 12 cores loaded you're thermally limited and tests show no difference to speak of at all. You get a slight boost to single threaded performance but overall this is the dullest upgrade in ages and creating a whole new XT line for it is silly. Should have just called it 3910X, 3810X and 3610X, at least then they'd get points for honesty.

Jurisdiction is not the only kind of power. China has repeatedly shown that they don't care if you're an American speaking out in America, if you're badmouthing China they will do what they can to make your life miserable. Of course they'll wrap their demands in weasel words and so will the corporate chain and your business partners but the real message is "STFU or we'll lose our business with China". Like any negotiations will be mysteriously stuck in a quagmire that'll equally mysteriously resolve itself once you're relieved of your position or the partnership is terminated.

To be honest Taiwan's problem is that the had delusions of grandeur, in 1971 when they lost their seat on the UN Security Council they themselves strongly refused any division of China and the creation of an independent Taiwan. Instead they forced it into a vote of who was the "legitimate" owner of China's seat and long story short they lost. If they wanted independence back then, they probably would have gotten it. Their problem now is that China has flipped the script on them, because they were pouting over the loss of the mainland China they never cut their losses and got their independence so now China wants them to answer to Beijing.

They don't realistically have much political or public support in Taiwan though. China is pressuring every other nation to recognize China's claim to Taiwan if they want to have relations with China, but that only makes it a hostile territory they could occupy at great cost - and probably not without an actual shooting war with an army supplied by the US military. My guess is they're eyeing the situation in Hong Kong waiting for the right moment to say status quo is no longer an option, it's either independence or submission and we choose independence. They must see that there's no future in trying to appease China.

Write no, compile yes. He's pulling code from all the subsystem maintainers (lieutenants) to create the master branch. And they again are mostly pulling other people's patches. They're supposed to make sure it's clean and tested before it reaches Linus but that's not always what happens. If it breaks or he finds bad code it goes back down the chain of command again so they can fix their code again and resubmit.

In rocket science I'd say 10+ launches is well into established already. The Falcon Heavy got their military certification after just three launches. The SLS is still planning to launch crew on their second flight. I suspect your sig is very relevant here:

My guess is one faulty part or installation brought the mission down. This was not a violent failure, the rocket just lost engine power and stopped. Which means it's probably the QA department and not the design department that needs to get to work.

Funny, I wish I had more of the first bit. Not my fuck-ups but the best times are those where I've been living in the moment and let go of all the rational, dull downers like that this junk food isn't good for me or that partying this hard will give me a hangover tomorrow or that this vacation is burning a hole in my wallet. Like I know that I'm overall fairly rational and got my shit in order, can't I get a break when I have a few excesses without that nagging party pooper in the back of my head. It's okay to have a plan for where you want to be five years from now but it's also important to accumulate happy memories on the way.

Bad employees also tend to think they're irreplaceable and they're as common as bad managers. The difference is that bad employees are the manager's problem, a bad manager is your problem. Unless you become the manager, then you see the other side of that equation. I don't mind taking on a tech lead position but if I went into middle management I'd probably end up strangling someone. I have the feeling I'd be one of those technically bright but horribly micromanaging bosses who'd rather be doing my underlings job than doing mine. Which would be mostly herding cats, running interference and communicating upwards, downwards and sideways in the hierarchy.

Intel drank that kool-aid and decided to make a CPU architecture where practically everything was exposed to the compiler, it's called IA-64 aka Itanium. They soon found out that a design grounded in reality beats ivory tower theory. ARM is also CISC with micro-ops these days, some instruction complexity is best left hidden. Forcing the compiler to deliver micro-instructions only hurts performance.