Bipartisan is such a weird concept for us living in the rest of the world. We have so many more parties than the two in the US.

Science fiction is in it’s essence the exploration of a situation when all the confounding factors have been magicked/scienced away.

Not uncommonly it explores the requirements of the technical solution, what would the machine need to do for this to work out? And/or What happens if it doesn’t?

Take for example “Do androids dream of electric sheep” by Philip K Dick, it’s about finding androids advanced enough not to know they’re artificial and how to identify and relate to them when the only diagnostic is slow, clumsy, and suspect. It’s more an exploration of what makes a person than it’s around the marvels of The Machine™.

During the 1900s the vehicle for science to magick with had been machines, computers and AI. Remember that space travel, fission power, psychology, modern medicine were all new, hope inducing breakthroughs just this same period.

There’s also the issue that the definition of the genre came after it becoming large enough to matter. The edges between scifi, punk/cyberpunk, speculative fiction, isekai and even to fantasy are all made after the fact, meaning modern machines go into scifi, old machines go into steam-/diesel-/etc-punk. The main difference between Science, Magick, and Eldritch horror is how detailed the mechanics of the solution are described, and speak to different people.

But on the topic of the story not being centered around a machine: try the Hyperion series by Dan Simmons.

Or go the entirely other way with Ring World by Larry Niven. There’s plenty of machines-did-it in the fringes, but the central theme is to figure out what would be needed for a Ring World to exist, what would happen on it, and how would it be managed. It’s an exploration of physics more than anything - more “what is the machine” than “machines-did-it”.

And the Foundation series (Asimov) famously explore the premise “what if sociology works”, and the other details solved by throwing machines at them.

You also have The Culture (Iain Banks) series that center on/around post-scarcity society and explore that.

Apparently privileged (cis, white, educated middle class or equivalent) men apply when fulfilling 60% of the requirements. Women and minorities 100%.

Maybe that’s why they have the ridiculous reqs?

Aww, I thought we were talking about Rimworld

Very nice writeup, thank you!

Cats do pant, but also run hotter and enjoy higher temperatures than humans (24-26 °C depending on race).

Also, cats have lots of ways to release heat, cats can arrange their fur to release more heat (or burr it to trap more), they lay on cool ground, they can lick themselves for evaporative cooling, and of course seek shade when it gets hot.

We had a hot summer with temperatures of over 30 °C indoors and I got worried my European shorthair would overheat, got them a gel pad that wicks away heat when laid upon, but they thought it was ridiculous and just laid on the concrete floor in the shade whenever too hot and was super comfy and lazy.

That’s actually a very cool idea.

Do a proper SS leather jacket but with a defiled swastika all over the back (so no one can mistake it) and reclaim it?

I’d probably not use the red band.

And would this become problematic in a decade when the jackets get normalised and mainstream (probably without the punk defiling)?

A conceivable way could be to disrupt the nuclear force of the target atoms, maybe like an anti-Pion/Gluon ray that self-propagates the reaction through the released energy.

(As we might remember, splitting the atom yields a bunch of energy, and uncontrolled such reactions go Hiroshima)

It might be controlled by sub-particle lensing, probably some kind of magnetic field, to be active at a specific distance.

For the reaction to be contained, either there’s a radially limiting component (air is not particle dense enough to propagate the reaction, or atoms not energy dense enough) or it’s a cascade triggered by the beam which stops when the beam stops (or the reaction gets too far away from it)

As I believe Pions and Gluons are their own anti-particles, I don’t know how we would go about doing this, but hey, that’s for Science!™ to solve.

I wouldn’t expect them to, but it would be a hilarious trolling :P

I also have a hard time believing this to be intentionally meaning bearing, mostly due to this being a pop art meme overused in both social media and marketing.

Compare it to the ad poster, it can be art, but most of the time it isn’t meant to. (and to my mind the ubiquity of ad posters raises the noise that the intentional art needs to cut through)

I believe OP is trying to troll the comm, or at least confused about the ambition of the comm.

But for shits and giggles I gave it a good 5 minutes of viewing and quite some generosity, two themes pop out: Contrast between old and new play, and a generational shift in Escapism

On the left side the legos are beige, interrupted by a line of chargers before the right side with candies, and the console controller.

This could try to convey a motif of a generational shift from constructive, wholesome play to an instant gratification paradigm. Maybe with the advent of the informational age

There’s a difference in compositional choices I don’t understand, and with the background of this art style am prone to dismiss as for visual effect rather than intentional meaning.

The shapes on the left side seem mostly to draw the eye rightward. The curve in the top left which could have signified a softening of regimentality is in contrast to the straight and formal positioning of non-rectangular pieces in the lower left. This could be trying to convey the variations or turmoil within the old paradigm, but this level of skill isn’t expected neither from art form nor artist, and as it’s a staple of the pop art style I’m leaning towards it being only for visual effect.

I find no way of differentiating the choice from just starting it as a social media post and half way thinking of a cool contrast.

Looking closer at the pills on the right side, none of them can be identified as pharmaceuticals, but several of them are famous candy shapes. I conclude that they most probably represent only candy and no pills/drugs.

Also on the right side, the controller breaks the motif and catches the eye, both for a visual payoff. But I see no reflection or contrast of controller against candy, nor divider, nor against lego.

If I stop looking for deeper meaning in the relations of elements and just look at emotional impact, it could simply be a nostalgic representation of early millennial childhood . Where the dividing line isn’t a divider, but it’s own part of a tableau, and the choice of items being significant as a collection rather than as elements.

I find no layers of meaning hidden in the contrast or relationships of elements, no artful nods that usually give away mastery enough to wield subtle meaning.

(and the more I look at it, the less I admire the craftsmanship)

I’ve had basil in DWC with bubbler and couldn’t eat or give away enough of it, it just grew so much (and was so potent). The rest match your experience.

As for nutrients, I do a trial run in a separate system and try to watch how the plant reacts. I’m amateur anyway, so losing a plant is expected. Question is just how much harvest I can get before then. With huge or automated systems you probably need precision and data, for my 10-30 plants I can just look at them :P

Other varieties that have worked well for me in DWC w/ bubbler: cucumber, flowering flax, every kind of lettuce, bok choi, cherry tomatoes, oregano, marjoram, thyme, shiso/red mint, microgreens, radish.

I’ve heard rumor of strawberries, wild strawberries, aubergine, even pumpkins to be good in DWC, and of course almost all types of chili.

I haven’t had any luck yet with lemongrass, rosemary, as you with coriander, fennel, strawberries, wild strawberries, among others.

Did a test run with flowering plants that had growth but no flowers, so that’s promising for a bit of fiddling with nutrients and lighting schedules.

At least once you can

You can’t really help someone that doesn’t want to be helped, until they want it you can only be supportive and an inspiration/showcase/model.

The way to break out of it is to focus on your zone of control and do small, but noticeable things. Even if you can only decide where the papers on your desk go, start there and put them where you want them, then practice putting them back in their new place as they move around.

Build upon that success with other small wins in areas you can affect, and slowly the zone will grow bigger.

Assuming the same density, about three times as much gravity.

Gravity scales linearly with volume which scales with the cube of the width, (3/2)³ is about 3,4.

But price increases of cereals ( bread, pasta, grains, etc.) increased by about 7,5 % last year alone, which is more than the inflation, and more than the increase after inflation.

That’s where people might complain. They still can’t afford food, as food prices increase faster than overall inflation

I appreciate a data supported argument, and love that you actually linked sources.

One thing that I feel is missing in most of the linked analyses is that inflation has also hit unevenly, and the price of basic goods has increased significantly more than overall inflation. Which would explain why households still have less disposable income, also the mean debt burden is much higher leading to loan costs being more common.

Or brought up by a neurodivergent parent, or sibling, or have an ND partner

Now we only have to elect decision makers that make policy on facts and not feelings.

Ah, but you’re just saying that as a professional troll.

Now compare that to: I think you’re mistaken, intent matters, and I believe extending trust that both parties want to convey something, rather than just dismiss others, is necessary for a discussion, and also for a communal discourse. If we’re just shouting into the void, no trust is needed, but for interactions and building a sense of community, we will need both trust and norms of collaboration.

Baselessly ascribing malicious intent is moreso a way to sow distrust and kill off discussion.

And besides, unless local regulations expressly forbid it, the income statements of those companies are after any fines and after any profit reducing measures (e.g. Amazon famously use investment schemes to reduce taxation), they do make the money to cover them in the shorter interval, or even shorter.