Disqus - Latest Comments for quixote

Re: Why Are Tesla Cars Involved In More Fatalities Than Any Other Auto Brand?

quixote — Sat, 16 Nov 2024 12:34:33 -0000

Yes, there has been research. Physical buttons outperform touchscreens (2022) . In an 'old school' car, Volvo V70, the driver took 10 seconds to perform four specific tasks. In the one Tesla, a Model 3, the driver took 23.5 seconds for the same task. Far from the worst, but well up in the pack of the poor usability of other touchscreen cars. In terms of distance travelled at the standard speed used in the tests, that's the difference between 306m vs 717m.

An extra 400m (almost half a kilometer) for accidents to happen is plenty to explain some of the difference in fatalities. Not why Tesla drivers have more trouble than other touchscreen cars, but some of the difference.

Re: RFK Jr. and Joe Rogan: Putting the old denialist technique of bad faith “Debate me, bro!” challenges on steroids

quixote — Tue, 27 Jun 2023 01:08:20 -0000

Aside from the impossibility of 'debating' someone who is not even wrong, which you cover very well, there's another point.

It's to note that scientists debate constantly. By all means, he (RFKjr in this case) should join in! 1) He has a hypothesis (vaccines bad!). 2) He designs a study to prove that case. 3) He publishes the study. Others can then write rebuttals if something needs rebutting, replicate the results with further studies, and change their minds.

Oh? He can't get past point 2? Well no wonder there's nothing to debate.

Re: Kellie-Jay Keen is attacked and mobbed by trans activists in New Zealand

quixote — Wed, 29 Mar 2023 03:21:47 -0000

I'm in New Zealand, not in Auckland, and saw this crap after it happened, on the news. Utterly appalling.

And the unadulterated irony of shutting up women whose event is Let Women Speak. Tells you everything you need to know about the anti-woman activists creating a riot.

I wonder what part of "free" in free speech they don't understand? And why they're so afraid of it?

Re: What’s Current: Detransitioner sues Permanente Medical Group and Kaiser Foundation Hospitals for transitioning her as a child

quixote — Wed, 22 Mar 2023 19:09:01 -0000

Re medical transition at young ages: as with all things medical, this really should depend on the individual situation, with the input of experience psychologists / psychiatrists, and stay weighted toward social transitioning unless there's high confidence among the professionals involved that medical transition really is right for a particular case.

Blanket bans feel wrong in the same way as the burn-the-terf coercive bullshit does. It shouldn't be anyone else's decision to make for the person involved.

>>>Which is why you don't medically transition (unless it truly is a good idea) until the age of majority. Then the person involved can make the choice to dump so many major life options for themselves.<<<

Re: Nuclear Fusion Won’t Save the Climate But It Might Blow Up the World

quixote — Thu, 26 Jan 2023 16:10:39 -0000

The other thing about "clean" fusion: if everything worked perfectly, the fusion reaction itself is "clean," but generates free neutrons which irradiate the surrounding materials. It's not clean, not even theoretically.

Another vested interest, besides the Defense Dept.: concrete suppliers. The plants use *billions* of dollars / euros in construction. That's billions in somebody's pocket as soon as construction starts. The fact that all that concrete production spews megatons of greenhouse gases is not their concern and is not figured into the carbon cost of the "clean" energy.

Great article!

Re: Royal Cam 2021 discussion

quixote — Sat, 03 Sep 2022 01:00:35 -0000

Same here! None of us were. :cry: but also :happy:

Re: Royal Cam 2021 discussion

quixote — Thu, 01 Sep 2022 00:40:51 -0000

I've been watching since QT was about two months old. What amazing birds the toroa / royal albatrosses are. The original Zen masters!

I love the lacy pattern on feathers on QT's back. What do people think of Iorangi as a name for her? It means cirrus clouds in Maori, and that's what the pattern reminds me of. Lacy wispy high clouds. She's the only one I've seen with that pattern.

I'm so excited to see her learning to fly. Keep posting those clips of her wonderful practice jumps! Marvelous to see. Thanks to all for the photos and videos.

Re: Women’s lunch causes mass death

quixote — Wed, 13 Apr 2022 01:10:10 -0000

Thoroughly brilliant! Thanks for a bit of laughter today!

Re: What’s Current: Women’s weightlifting medalists decline question about Laurel Hubbard

quixote — Mon, 09 Aug 2021 00:24:01 -0000

Not satire. Apparently it's the term for one of the weightlifting moves. :rolleyes:

Re: What’s Current: Women’s weightlifting medalists decline question about Laurel Hubbard

quixote — Sun, 08 Aug 2021 02:29:29 -0000

I don't know what I'm angrier about. That Hubbard, for a vanity project, was given the spot which should have gone to the woman from Nauru or Tonga. Or that Hubbard's essential unfitness showed itself, after taking the spot for a vanity project.

They're always saying how much of a top athlete's performance depends on mental stamina. Hubbard showed how much that's true and how much Hubbard is not a top athlete in any sense.

If we're lucky (what are the chances of that?) coaches will learn from this not to foist any old whatnot onto women's competitions.

Re: What’s Current: Trans-identified males with sex convictions against women lawful in female jails, UK High Court rules

quixote — Tue, 06 Jul 2021 18:48:48 -0000

The mechanism, as far as I can see, is being oblivious that women even have feelings, let alone trauma about living under constant potential for attack. (Eg, see famous study about what male students did to protect themselves when walking home at night (spoiler: nothing, didn't even think about it) versus women who filled up whole pages with strategies and precautions.

Since women rank somewhere below eggplant in sentience, obviously you have to worry about the only person in the situation who can be hurt.

Re: What’s Current: Trans-identified males with sex convictions against women lawful in female jails, UK High Court rules

quixote — Sat, 03 Jul 2021 21:52:19 -0000

The UK decision re trans in women's jails is gobsmacking. The judge explicitly notes that many women in jail have been sexually abused, that many trans applying to get into women's jails have sex crimes in their background, including convictions, that women's fear of the situation is entirely "understandable."

But it's more important when balancing the "rights" involved to respect the penis-havers' fee-fees. (He used more technical legal language.)

The RSPCA has more consideration for the rights of abused of pets than this judge has for women.

Re: What’s Current: Study shows domestic violence is a precursor of mass shootings

quixote — Tue, 15 Jun 2021 01:11:08 -0000

Do you still have the link to the study on anti-woman violence and terrorism? I'm curious to look at that study. Thanks! (It's, what?, about the 50th time the connection has been obvious.)

Re: Here’s why Andrew Sullivan’s proposed ‘truce’ on transgenderism doesn’t work

quixote — Tue, 13 Apr 2021 22:58:05 -0000

To the extent that he has sensible recommendations, I'm irritated that he doesn't refer to any of the feminists who've been saying THE SAME DAMN THINGS for-bloody-ever. Knowing Sullivan, he probably doesn't know they exist.

To the extent that he's full of himself, I'm irritated because I've had it to *here* with guys suddenly noticing that water is wet and being stunned with their own smarts.

And when (not if. When) he doesn't have anywhere near the same pile-ons as any woman who figured it out decades before him, I'm going to be worse than irritated.

Re: What’s Current: Female corrections officers speak out against California trans inmate law

quixote — Mon, 12 Apr 2021 03:30:51 -0000

(I hit the downvote by accident when trying to hit Reply. Sorry about that! No way to tell the stupid system, "Mistake!" I've hit upvote just to get it back to even.)

Re: What’s Current: Female corrections officers speak out against California trans inmate law

quixote — Mon, 12 Apr 2021 00:51:50 -0000

From what I've read, searching inmates includes palpating to make sure nothing is hidden in the groin area. If that was a strip search, yes, you'd have to be pushing at the guy's genitals to check the whole area.

Add to that the point that at least in the UK the number skyrocketed of males who were in for sex crimes who suddenly discovered they were trans once easy self-ID became a thing. Now something like 50% (53%?) of mtf trans in UK women's prisons have sex crime convictions. I could see that stripsearching someone like that, who was gloating about what she had to do (there have been reports of this) would be even more horrible for a female guard.

Re: Wicked women and the weaponization of abuse

quixote — Tue, 21 Jul 2020 17:26:37 -0000

If women spoke about their pain and were heard, that would mean feeling for them. As if they were human!

Re: What’s Current: Israel becomes 8th country to adopt the Nordic Model of prostitution law

quixote — Tue, 07 Jul 2020 04:13:50 -0000

Indeed! Some actual progress for a change. /*breathes sigh of relief*/

Re: The Karen/Becky meme has officially gone too far

quixote — Tue, 23 Jun 2020 22:50:20 -0000

The only thing missing from making this a medieval witch hunt is the actual burning. The ostracism, the job loss/impoverishment, the terror we already have.

The men (and women after social status points) doing this long ago were also protecting their communities from those awful women capable of calling down magic to make men feel bad.

But they never explain how women powerful enough to commit (literal!) violence with mere words, can't seem to fend off the witch hunters at all.

Convenient, that. For the witch hunters.

Re: The world plays dumb with JK Rowling

quixote — Sun, 14 Jun 2020 04:10:33 -0000

A genius (anonymous, so likely a woman) has come up with the perfect term for people who flip their lid over women who insist on their right to exist:

WERMs. Women Exclusionary Radical Misogynists

Re: LET'S DIVE IN: The updated "Medicare for America" bill is here!

quixote — Fri, 17 Apr 2020 18:18:45 -0000

On the whole my reading comprehension isn't too bad, and I do understand that you're trying to prevent attacks about any loopholes by closing every loophole with piles of details.

Even I find my eyes glazing over.

It sounds like (but I could be wrong because my eyes glazed over) that a couple with a gross income of around $100,000 would be paying something like $3500? per year, $6500? per year up front.

That is not going to generate enough support to pass. Too many people are not going to care that income less than around $50,000 means $0 cost up front. Too many people in the 90th percentile of income are not going to be willing to have thousands of dollars extracted for this. Hundreds of dollars, yes. Thousands, no.

The cost has to be paid by billionaires and the top 1%. Some costs can come out of general taxes for the top 10% if it's not more than a few hundred dollars. Yes, that means redistribution of wealth. It's also something that can get enough of a large majority to overwhelm insurance company bullshit aimed at politicians.

Re: REVIEW: ‘Boys & Sex: Young men on hookups, love, porn, consent, and navigating the new masculinity’

quixote — Sun, 01 Mar 2020 02:54:36 -0000

So I've gotten to here, figuring at some point the link to this article would appear. Apparently finding it is left as an exercise for the reader?

Sorry, but no. Please link to the article you're talking about so that we can all be sure we're reading the same thing. If you don't know how to make a link, just copy-and-paste in the URL.

Re: What’s Current: Lesbian event removed from Sydney Pride due to accusations of ‘transphobia’ against Arielle Scarcella

quixote — Thu, 27 Feb 2020 17:02:28 -0000

Well, I don't know, I went to a huge gay pride parade in San Francisco eons ago (2003?) and Dykes on Bikes was just about the headline event. My general impression was that then there were lots of lesbian participants.

No question that even then there were noticeably more gay guys than any other demographic. Maybe at that point they hadn't yet coalesced around kicking the girls out of the clubhouse?

Re: Prostitution is already destigmatized, and it’s not helping

quixote — Fri, 31 Jan 2020 14:05:20 -0000

The data show *less* violence against prostitutes in Nordic Model countries. How can that be? Well, when the buyer is criminalized and the seller is not, she can call the police if he gets abusive. So -- I know this surprising -- he tends not to be abusive.

If you're for "empowering women" why don't you want them to have the power to call the police on abusive johns?

Re: If Aliens Exist Elsewhere in the Universe, How Would They Behave? | At the Smithsonian | Smithsonian Magazine

quixote — Wed, 01 Jan 2020 01:29:37 -0000

You've answered your own question, haven't you? Only a species that learns self-restraint, one where people don't do whatever they want just because they can get away with it, can survive discovering science.

So, if aliens ever do visit, that would imply they're not likely to be monsters.

As for why they haven't, it could be merely random. They don't happen to have landed here. Or learning self-restraint is a very rare event and so far nobody has in our galaxy.