> Without any Pokémon-specific optimization, Step 5 Preview has so far sustained progress for more than 3,000 turns and 6 million tokens of interaction. By turn 3,082, it had unlocked Cut, earned three Gym Badges, and defeated Lt. Surge. The run is now roughly one-third of the way through the main story.
Finally FireRed is being used as a benchmark again! I believe Astra can beat it in 18 hours. Not sure how that compares.
> They identified two different brain progenitor cells. One, which expresses a gene called Otx2, is destined to become the forebrain and midbrain. The other, which expresses a gene called Gbx2, is committed to forming the hindbrain. They showed that these two cell populations never overlap; they are mutually exclusive from the earliest stages of development.
Very cool. Never thought the brain could have two completely different ancestors
"Nervous systems are typically defined as networks of neurons that communicate across synapses. But Burkhardt’s lab found something unique in ctenophores: Beneath the animal’s outer surface is a nerve net (pink mesh in this 3D reconstruction) whose neurons are connected by continuous cytoplasm — but with no synapses between them. “I don’t think any other animal has a nervous system like that,” Burkhardt said. Because ctenophores are one of the earliest branches of the animal family tree, the finding indicates that evolution may have crafted nervous systems twice: in ctenophores, and separately in jellyfish and all other animals."
Like the thought:) But actually have read that the hypothesis that the hindbrain (or lower brain) had evolved directly from our lizard ancestors while the upper brain (which does more complex types of thought) evolved later turned out to be wrong. Like the study has shown, they evolved at the same time, and many animals had both. It's just in humans, the upper brain evolved much larger in proportion to the lower brain.
If you follow motor oil geek on YouTube, they've started changing the formulations of the premium oils months ago and that's not going to change until 2028 when more American supply comes online
Still a great skill, but at this point, I just write "I have adhd, can you explain that again" or "I have adhd". Works great for compressing it ELI5, but less dumb
Another favorite of fine is asking it read something then to tell me any "questions, comments concerns" it has. Great for getting the jist of articles fast.
Climate change affects geographies unequally. Seems like Europe and the tropics have been the first to suffer, year after year, and with the UK losing that warm current in ~47 years, can't help but wonder what is on European minds.
The main thing I have in mind is that human civilization is completely fucked. What is needed to ensure things aren’t too horrible in the next century is so drastic and requires such a global coordinated effort that will never happen. There is no technology or super authority that will magically save us from a climate catastrophe this century.
Given the vast majority of the world population still see vegetarianism as a joke and not a necessity, and developed countries are ready to sacrifice pretty much everything to the AI compute gods we are truly fucked
>the vast majority of the world population still see vegetarianism as a joke and not a necessity
I'm pretty convinced that lots of people would be willing to make sacrifices. But not while Mark Zuckerberg is allowed to feed his Angus beef Macadamia nuts on Hawaii and all the invitees fly in separate private jets to COP26 instead of making it an online event.
The message of "sacrifice for thee, but not for me!" should not be underestimated here.
You can only control your own actions. Reducing your meat consumption by like 80% is very low effort. It’s honestly ridiculous that still has to be argued about
The ridiculous is that we talk about this individual change nonsense when we should be talking about actual regulations and restrictions of industries.
Yes, hit the biggest poluters who incidentally put so much money into anti-climate agenda. Stop distracting with tiny individual crap.
I mean, it's a collective action problem. Individual consumption of normal people is a huge contributor to global energy demands / pollution / etc. You don't have to change your behavior but if no one does in the coming decades then we're pretty fucked.
Not to let the 1% off the hook. Por que no los dos
You cannot solve societal problems with individual actions.
It's about time to cut the crap that each person can make a difference while governments keep subsidizing all sorts of activities that damage the environment.
I will vote for forbidding beef, but will keep eating it until it is forbidden.
I somewhat agree, and I have not stopped eating beef entirely. I think that forbidding is overkill but agree that lots of related subsidies should be eliminated (honestly, if meat were just priced w/o current subsidies, we'd be in far better shape).
But you have to have some public consensus or the government will never implement such changes due to their unpopularity. This is why I think promoting some reduction in individual meat consumption is still valuable - it is good for average people to reflect on their consumption or they will vote out anyone who attempts to change it.
I don't think that the focus should be on individual blame (even just for the reason that this is politically nonviable). But you at least need to amass some collective awareness.
I love beef. I absolutely adore cheese, and I would be unfathomably sad to never again taste a nice piece of Gorgonzola.
But I know that the meat and dairy industry are hellish for the environment. You don't need to win me in that argument, I accepted that already.
But that's the catch - either we are all in this together, or we will burn in this oven-earth of our making. There's no between. I am not becoming vegan just to die scorched anyway because meat and dairy were still subsidized and consumed.
Governments are surprisingly good to set proper incentives when they want. It could make beef and dairy economically ruinous with taxes instead of forbidding. Consumption would lower dramatically the moment a striploin beef is costing 30 bucks.
If society needs several environmental catastrophes to wake up, then I can only hope I see the other side of it.
Changing peoples culture is about as simple as changing peoples religion. Getting people who eat meat to switch to vegetarianism is like trying to get vegetarians to reduce their land usage by switching to some amount of shell fish or sea weed, the later which is vegetarian but not necessary the kind of plants that people are used to.
It should be much easier to convince people that emission free energy production is a necessity, and yet there is for all practical purpose no such political movement or any political party that actually support the simple fact that producing electricity and heat through burning carbon based fuel is completely unnecessary and should have been relegated as a something past civilizations did. We don't need to convince the world population to change their culture in order to not construct new thermal power plants, only political will and money.
We don't need AI to figure it out. It's been researched to death already. Go vegetarian, abolish fossil fuels, buy less.
The problem is that way too few are willing to change their habits, and legislators have near-zero incentive to enact unpopular rules to help mitigate the problems. AI isn't going to change any of that.
well, we managed to construct a narrative where everyone could only marginally change its habits. heat pumps, electric cars, solar panels, carbon taxes. things would have remained unchanged at the high level.
but that was still way too much to ask. I'm afraid that if you insist on reducing the solution space to just 'it magically goes away and no one has to think about it', even the mighty AI might struggle. why don't fire up Claude and ask it?
Lol. Firstly, how we live now is far different to how we lived 100 years ago (people ate far less red meat than we do today for example). Secondly, how the bulk of humanity lives is inevitably going to change drastically. The choice we have is to do it voluntarily and perhaps control how it changes, or wait until core crops start failing in a big way and livestock die off due to prolonged drought and heatwaves.
Yeah, conflict is guaranteed. China will probably invade Russia and secure Lake Baikal and vast areas of Siberia. Europe might start shooting at "smugglers" earnestly (sorry to the "collateral damage").
I guess Eric or Barron will follow Project 2025 Edition 10's guideline and invade Greenland to secure their water for USA. And Canada's favorable climate?
I tell anyone I meet to seriously consider what immigration will be like when anthropogenic global warming will get stronger. I'm neither pro/against immigration but I know many people are scared by immigration (as is demonstrated in many EC countries by the progression of far right parties).
I also tell them to remember that food prices and insurances prices will inevitably go up.
And I won't much more that that because everything else fails (even the death of 1000 persons in my country during this years heat waves just make people say "bah, that's life")
Are you somehow under the illusion that countries that "send" immigrants now will be accepting of return immigrants in the future? Whether they be the same people that left or other people coming in?
This is 100% a one way street for most governments.
Next year, el nino may hit and the extremes will set new records again. I wonder if einstein was right and human stupidity is infinite. On the other side, we can achieve alot as a society when the narratives are positive.
I don’t think el Niño affects Europe so directly. As a second order effect, sure, but here the heatwaves and el Niño are simultaneous. And this year is going to break records significantly. Again. No need to wait for next year, which could be the tail end of the current Niño, a regression to the mean, or the beginning of the next Niña.
In any case, Europe is warming up faster than the global average, Niño or not.
The current El Niño hasn’t “hit” in Europe yet. Its effects in Europe will most likely be felt in the first quarter of 2027. I’d assumed that’s what the parent was referring to.
El Niño does not really hit Europe in any way. It influences several things, like the jet streams, but the effects on Europe are very indirect and much milder than in the Pacific. They are also delayed by a couple of months.
>with the UK losing that warm current in ~47 years
>> What's that going to look like?
There is a very graphic way to understand the problem.
Some cities in Canada are Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal, Quebec, Winnipeg or Regina.
London and Berlin are closer to the North Pole that any of these
-----------------------
Minimum temperature registered in London -17 Celsius. In Quebec and Montreal: -36 and -37.8 Celsius.
Berlin is a little closer than London to the North Pole but also more continental, so more like Regina in that sense.
Berlin lowest temperature registered is -15 Celsius, and in Regina: -40 Celsius
... And Edinburgh is closer to the North pole than any of these, and a little Northern than Manitoba, where reaching -40 Celsius a few nights is expected each year, and more than 30 Celsius in the summer is normal.
UK here. It really feels like this year has been a massive wake-up call, a follow-up to the one of 2022 (and 2018, 2019, 2021...)
Some fire services have had their busiest months on record this year. In an extraordinary (and controversial) move, they convinced the government to use the phone Emergency Alert system to alert the entire country about the risk of fires.
Prior to summer, in the North of England, it was extremely windy and gloomy from September to May. Very very few blue skies. The other day, we went from a 2-day mini heat wave (35c & 28c) to gloomy cloud in 2 days - it's just so bizarre.
We've just had our 5th or 6th heatwave of the summer
A train derailed yesterday due to a buckled rail. Another derailed, cause of which is suspected to be heat/drought related. Luckily no fatalities.
We've had more wildfires than 2022 and drought is more widespread. I often can't have my window open at night when it's 29c inside because of the fires 10-20 miles away. I have no A/C
I'm wondering if our future is gales and grey for 9 months then heatwaves and drought? I know the North of England is historically gloomy, but it 'feels' different of late.
It feels like we do not have the money to begin to prepare and fix things that need fixing to continue the life we have. We haven't built a reservoir since 1990 despite massive population increase. Our rail network is not prepared for heat waves or long periods of drought or long periods of rain or long periods of ice/snow. London buses mostly have no A/C, ditto rest of the country. Many people don't have money for A/C at home - not even sure our electricity network could handle it. And about 100 other issues...
Full HVAC was added to the New London Bus Vehicle Specification a few years ago, so at least TfL were paying attention to the implications of climate change.
Pretty much all BEV buses have it (even the ones from before it became mandatory, since they plenty of power to spare anyway), which already covers more than 40% of the fleet, and the remaining hybrid buses are in the process of being phased out over the next few years. Sadly, the 'Boris bus' New Routemasters with their famously-inadequate forced air cooling are likely to be the last to go because they can't be sold on for less-intensive use elsewhere.
No-one else should really be being surprised by the changes to our weather patterns, since they're all roughly in line with the modelled effects of the changing climate. Air to air heat pumps (which work as AC) are now included in the various grant schemes, £30bn is being spent to upgrade the national grid by 2029, and the shift to zero carbon energy sources is well under way.
The water situation is more problematic, but in the short term the current El Nino increases the likelihood of having a wet winter so at least the reservoirs ought to have a chance to fully refill this year.
>It feels like we do not have the money to begin to prepare and fix things that need fixing to continue the life we have.
Oh, you have the money.
You just don't want to spend it, for that would shift the balance of political power in the country towards labor and away from capital, and away from the old and towards the young, for the wages of labor and the young would have to rise.
That's anathema to an upper class and a body politic whose primary objective is controlling the cost of labor, and even the political party that's named after labor has no plan to change that.
This is going to continue until the current body politic is more afraid of dying from heatstroke than they are of anyone else being in charge.
Note that, first, there really is not much point to doing anything if you don't reduce by at least 52% in 3 years or less (less than that, or more time, will not make the difference between IPCC >2 and <2 scenarios). Hence without drastic reductions from the Chinese government (not promises, not "look at our beautiful new solar field", ONLY we're stopping these HUNDREDS of coal mines WITHIN 2 years) you've pretty much already lost, since a lot of countries lower on the list will definitely be increasing, and have declared it colonization for the west to demand they stop. Oh, by the way, you also must convince many African countries to stop that whole "electricity for our people" thing, otherwise the needed reduction is also a pipedream.
Note that just stopping CO2 output does not matter if it just gets transplanted somewhere else. In other words: the only way to make a difference is to stop first coal and then oil from being dug up in the first place, and let the CO2 emissions "take care of themselves". Otherwise CO2 emission reductions are local, not global, and so without reducing coal mining and oil pumping reductions do not matter and will not make any difference to global warming.
The only countries in the EU that have any influence at all is Norway, and they would have to just give up between 20% and 40% of their national income (France and the Netherlands are rounding errors, and Russia is not EU), and that's a typical figure.
And just so we're clear: reducing GDP by 20% to 40% will require a multiple of that in average wage reductions (so let's say at least 50%), without rents reducing by a single cent. You know, to give some idea what you're actually asking for from Norwegians.
In other words: this will not happen, there is no way in hell the governments involved will agree to even half of what's needed. And the UK, in fact all western governments other than Norway, US, Canada and Mexico have no influence and cannot realistically make a meaningful contributions to stopping climate change. And even those countries that can contribute will have to give up A LOT and it won't matter unless you get China, Russia and Saudi Arabia to follow suit.
Oh and if you do get this going, it'll cause a lot of pain in most of the world.
You have not been paying attention. China, and every socialist country for that matter, is part of every authoritarian network, serving their own purposes.
Well in my mind is no one else cares and the EU is holier than pope. We are destroying our economy for promile of world polution and are even shamed for using AC.
It’s the "it’s real, but we cannot do anything about it" rung on the climate denialist ladder. Yes, it is dangerous. It is also mainstream. There are several examples in this thread.
We are focusing on wrong things. Nuclear and off coal/gas should have been priority for last 50 years. And should be priority next 50. But Russian propaganda entrenched in spy infested austria and germany forces cheap gas upon us… and now we have to pay the price.
> Nuclear and off coal/gas should have been priority for last 50 years.
No argument from me. It would not have completely saved us but we’d be in a better position now. The absolute priority should be to avoid burning fossil fuels for energy.
> But Russian propaganda entrenched in spy infested austria and germany forces cheap gas upon us
Indeed. Germany’s energy policy was a huge risk and set Europe back. I am not sure whether Schröder was a useful idiot or a willing pawn, but the fact that there was no reckoning is very disappointing. And all of Merkel’s balancing act came to naught anyway. So much time wasted…
Game theory gives all of us an optimal solution, so we all should care about every bit, no matter the global proportion. Btw. Chians per capital CO2 emission is lower than most of europe.
Yeah but earth is not heating up per capita. And all the developing world emissions are rising. We go to extreme to not even move the needle. Then china takes our factories, because we have expensive energy and stricter safety laws - i am not arguing against it. And europe is left economically decimated.
It’s becoming less, but the formerly widespread traditional view in Europe was that using AC is a frivolous waste of energy that contributes to environmental pollution and global warming.
Its part of disrourse. Every left/communist says that AC will not solve the heat and we should not install it. We know it wont. But not having it makes the heats unbearable.
"We must absolutely not install air conditioning everywhere; that would only make things worse." The words of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the radical left La France Insoumise party, on Friday, June 19, in response to the far-right Rassemblement National (RN)'s large-scale air conditioning plan, reflect a widely held sentiment in France.
No they cannot, it’s just a right-wing strawman. And something that perturbs some Americans, for some reason. Another "proof" that Europe is a terrible place inhabited by clueless idiots.
I don’t know if you read beyond the paywall and you don’t present a single argument, so I struggle to see your point. The article has fuck all to do with actually getting shamed for buying AC. Regulations need to change with the climate, that’s a different discussion altogether. The whole point of the article is a nuanced discussion about pros and cons, and why we are where we are.
I am on a bike and cannot properly do the research. But i have read no AC from german, french and brusels leftist think tanks all summer :) almost as it is a sin to have AC when the world is burning and we should suffer.
Finally FireRed is being used as a benchmark again! I believe Astra can beat it in 18 hours. Not sure how that compares.