Something I’ve been thinking a lot about recently is the relationship between perceived intelligence, wealth, and motivation. We tend to self-select our social group for people of similar mindsets, so we often don’t get much exposure to the “other”, and it can be a bit shocking. But I think the point that a lot of “high IQ” people miss is that there are varying forms of intelligence that are not captured by an IQ test and still correlate highly with financial and social success. I know people that are incredibly bad with their money and make life choices repeatedly that put them in stressful situations, and yet they always seem to be the darling of their friend group even though they are constantly in need, and somehow manage to land on their feet. We all know people who don’t seem to understand the basics of their field, and yet somehow have been promoted to a leadership role where they make 2-3x the salary of the “experts” they are managing because they are better at networking and office politics.
In at least the United States, being a “self-made” person is often equated to being skilled in their field, but in reality the skill they possess is knowing how to get other people’s money. And oftentimes the reason why these people have so much money is precisely because they don’t spend it on things that an “intelligent” person would (like curing malaria).
So in relation to the article, I would disagree that there are “no stupid people”, I would say that there are objectively stupid decisions made by all of us when viewed from a certain perspective or goal. Giving away money to help others is stupid from the perspective of somebody whose only goal is to have a lot
of it. You can be socially stupid, financially stupid, or logically stupid, and your form of stupidity may correlate to success in your culture. And if you are stupid in a way that makes you unsuccessful, it leads to frustration.
The biggest thing people seem to be up in arms over is the disk space. I don’t see any of the suggestions on that page freeing the disk space back up, please correct me if I’m wrong.
Space is really, really big. I think it's hard for us to comprehend just how much space is in space, especially in 3-dimensional terms. It would take a lot of sand to mine all of the useful orbital space, and that's just LEO. There's tons of room in higher orbits. It would measurably increase the risk of passing through LEO on the way to other destinations and make some orbital planes unusable for e.g. Starlink or human habitation, but when you're just passing through, the odds of getting punctured are probably still reasonable, at least for unmanned spacecraft. Keep in mind that the ISS maneuvers out of the way when there are several miles to a potential impactor, just in case. We have all our eggs in one basket right now, so everybody is really careful with that one basket.
LEO is relatively simple to destroy simply because it's already so populated with mass, and that population is growing rapidly, and because they all come pretty close to crossing each other's orbits. Collisions with even very small pieces of debris typically generate secondary debris, growing the population.
A half-hour boost phase through LEO to get to higher orbit is dramatically less risky than spending 87600 hours there over a 10-year orbital lifespan. In the event that it all goes asymptotic, what sort of timescales would be afflicted by collision risks 10^6 or 10^9 or 10^12 greater than what exist now, I am uncertain.
Low earth orbit isn't that much space though right ? It is effectively a stack of practical orbital shells. A rogue nation state can make satellite launches financially unfeasible.
It would take a lot of sand to mine all of the useful orbital space, and that's just LEO.
Nope. You just need to make it a high enough probability of your spaceship being damaged that people won't take the risk. For humans that's very low. For anything moderately expensive it's quite low.
There's tons of room in higher orbits.
You have to go through the lower orbits to get there.
> You have to go through the lower orbits to get there
Math doesn't math.
The closest solution I've seen is putting 10^6 to 10^9 kg fragmented debris in the 700 to 1,000 km band to create a 5% failure rate at fastest transit, which is economically devastating. But that assumes away grain-grain collisions.
I think when I last ran the math, you'd need to sustain 5 to 10 Starship loads of fragmented debris to that orbit a week to create a proper barrier–near 100% hazard. At which point the solution becomes shooting down those launch vehicles. In a couple years (3 to 10, depending on the solar cycle), the skies would clear to about 1% hazard. That hazard, however, would persist for some time–how long is anybody's guess.
Unfortunately probably not available in Australia, but as I've mentioned in other comments, GM for all its faults has managed to check all these boxes with the Bolt EV. It feels pretty much like a normal, boring car, which is a great thing. The only thing that violates the author's must-haves is that they put the A/C, heat, and heated seat controls on the touchscreen, although the "auto" climate control works well and is operated with a physical knob. Also I believe we have the higher trim model and it does not have motorized seats or seat memory, thankfully my wife and I are similarly proportioned enough that I only have to move the seat forward when I drive. It is by far my favorite of all the vehicles we've owned in recent years, and it's very affordable in the US.
I am the author of the blog post and yep, the Chevy Bolt is basically the perfect car (for me at least). Ticks all the boxes. Apparently the 2027 Bolt RS has driver's seat memory.
But the Bolt isn't available in Australia! GM abandoned us when they shut down Holden. Ironically, it was designed for production based on a South Korean prototype in Port Melbourne, 40km from where I live! https://www.carsguide.com.au/car-news/chevrolet-bolt-reveale...
Anecdotally, to me it's just more fun. It increases range by relying entirely on the regenerative braking and relegating the disc brakes to an "emergency" role. For freeway driving in traffic it's also more intuitive, since you don't have to balance coasting/braking and can just ease off the pedal more to slow down quickly. Muscle memory can definitely be hard to break though, when I'm in a hurry I sometimes forget to enable single-pedal and drive for a bit before I realize it. The car we have (Chevy Bolt) has a separate regenerative brake control as a paddle on the back of the steering wheel for use in "regular" mode, but it's awkwardly placed.
It increases range by relying entirely on the regenerative braking and relegating the disc brakes to an "emergency" role.
I'm not sure about the Bolt, but most EVs work that way, one-pedal or not. Even a hybrid Prius doesn't seem to use the friction brakes unless it has to (emergency, coming to a low speed stop).
I don't like one-pedal on the Hyundai Ioniq if for no other reason than it uses both front/rear motors regardless. In contrast to Eco/Normal mode that uses the front motor only if it feels the need for moar power!!
Not only that, but why buy diamonds when Moissanite exists? Not as hard as diamond (by a tiny amount) but much less brittle and much more sparkle. Also even more “rare” than diamond since the only natural occurring ones are microscopic. Plus they come in colors! It took a while to talk my wife down off of the diamond industry’s hype, but she loves lab grown stones now.
In at least the United States, being a “self-made” person is often equated to being skilled in their field, but in reality the skill they possess is knowing how to get other people’s money. And oftentimes the reason why these people have so much money is precisely because they don’t spend it on things that an “intelligent” person would (like curing malaria).
So in relation to the article, I would disagree that there are “no stupid people”, I would say that there are objectively stupid decisions made by all of us when viewed from a certain perspective or goal. Giving away money to help others is stupid from the perspective of somebody whose only goal is to have a lot of it. You can be socially stupid, financially stupid, or logically stupid, and your form of stupidity may correlate to success in your culture. And if you are stupid in a way that makes you unsuccessful, it leads to frustration.