bkimmel's recent activity

  1. Comment on 2025 NFL Season šŸˆ Weekly Discussion Thread ā€“ Week 3 in ~sports.american_football

  2. Comment on I tried to protect my kids from the internet. Hereā€™s what happened. in ~tech

    bkimmel
    Link Parent
    This is the answer. My fever dream is that I'm going to get my son and a small group of friends LoRA Meshtastic radios and they think it's cool and just use those.

    This is the answer. My fever dream is that I'm going to get my son and a small group of friends LoRA Meshtastic radios and they think it's cool and just use those.

    2 votes

  3. Comment on How are you planning for a potentially bleaker future? in ~life

    bkimmel
    Link
    Malthus would like a word with you.

    Malthus would like a word with you.

    2 votes

  4. Comment on As religion wanes, how do we replace it? in ~humanities

  5. Comment on As religion wanes, how do we replace it? in ~humanities

    bkimmel
    Link
    Some interesting research on the subject: Also: And generally, when they do give they give more: And I think there are other philosophical/intellectual problems that come with the loss of...

    Some interesting research on the subject:

    investigators examined the behavior of a large sample of the public across a typical seven-day period. They found that among Americans who attend services weekly and pray daily, 45 percent had done volunteer work during the previous week. Among all other Americans, only 27 percent had volunteered somewhere.

    Also:

    Pew has found that among Americans who attend worship weekly and pray daily, about half gather with extended family members at least once a month. For the rest of our population, itā€™s 30 percent.

    And generally, when they do give they give more:

    Philanthropic studies show that people with a religious affiliation give away several times as much every year as other Americans. Research by the Lilly School at Indiana University found Americans with any religious affiliation made average annual charitable donations of $1,590, versus $695 for those with no religious affiliation.

    And

    And people with religious motivations donā€™t give just to faith-based causesā€”they are also much likelier to give to secular causes than the nonreligious.

    I think there are other philosophical/intellectual problems that come with the loss of religion, but those are more abstract. The hard numbers from respected research outfits like Pew paint the problem pretty starkly: Secular communities, even where they exist, don't produce the same kinds of pro-social behaviors that religious ones do. It's not just qualitatively different in some abstract way, it's an enormous quantitative problem. By some estimates, 73 percent of all giving in the U.S. is directed at explicitly religious groups (e.g. Catholic Charities).

    It's fine to have your personal beliefs and I'm not saying anyone is obligated to behave a certain way in terms of what or who they give their money to, but you can't really claim those statistics are insignificant with any kind of intellectual honesty.

    1 vote

  6. Comment on The web could be so much more beautiful in ~tech

    bkimmel
    Link
    Yes! I gave a whole presentation on this at work and I've been chasing people to use it more for years! It's nuts that even "design-forward" outfits like Apple don't use this yet when monks in the...

    Yes! I gave a whole presentation on this at work and I've been chasing people to use it more for years!

    It's nuts that even "design-forward" outfits like Apple don't use this yet when monks in the 14th century had this figured out in their manuscripts.

    I will say the results aren't always "100 percent awesome' and sometimes you can get better results by manually seeding some soft-hyphens in the text but it drives me bonkers seeing everything either left-justified or with huge whitespace rivers when 'hyphens: auto' has been there for at least 5 years now.

    2 votes

  7. Comment on Who'all remembers the A-bomb Kid? Guess what he's doing today... in ~talk

    bkimmel
    Link Parent
    I also just remembered his company sued NGP (another political data company that worked exclusively with Dems). Not the kind of thing you would do if you were trying to be clandestine.

    I also just remembered his company sued NGP (another political data company that worked exclusively with Dems). Not the kind of thing you would do if you were trying to be clandestine.

    2 votes

  8. Comment on Who'all remembers the A-bomb Kid? Guess what he's doing today... in ~talk

    bkimmel
    Link
    Oh, wow. I knew that guy and met him a few times but I had no idea about the nuclear stuff. I just thought he was the CEO of that company. Iirc, he offered me a job with Aristotle while I was...

    Oh, wow. I knew that guy and met him a few times but I had no idea about the nuclear stuff. I just thought he was the CEO of that company. Iirc, he offered me a job with Aristotle while I was working at the DNC.

    I always had the impression that Aristotle (the company) was never really that successful in political data because it was a very tribal thing and neither side could really trust them to engage on anything big.

    I recall them doing something in Afghanistan back in the day but I don't remember it being alarming. I will say they always seemed to be a little "bigger" in terms of staff than their business would allow for, but I always assumed it was the guy (Aristotle) who was just independently wealthy or something.

    Could be there really was something there and I was just oblivious to it and his company was always a little weird in some way that was tough to put your finger on, but from what I knew/remembered I would think other things would be more concerning.

    7 votes

  9. Comment on What is your opinion whenever you see news/opinion that tech companies are relying more on chatbots rather than junior developers/interns? in ~tech

    bkimmel
    Link
    Everyone tends to have their reticle fixed on what AI can do. And I understand why: it's an impressive step change in a short period of time. No one seems to ask "What can AI never do?". It can't...

    Everyone tends to have their reticle fixed on what AI can do. And I understand why: it's an impressive step change in a short period of time. No one seems to ask "What can AI never do?".

    It can't ever take responsibility for anything. Which places a very hard upper limit on how useful it can be in any serious engineering environment. There is no neck to wring, no reputation to keep.

    It can't ever buy anything. Which limits its economic impact. It can create things people value (again, amazing and I understand why people lose their religion over this) but economics is a loop and until Google gives Gemini and allowance for doing its chores, it cannot surpass an 8-year old child in terms of closing that loop.

    4 votes

  11. Comment on What historic unsolved mysteries do you want solved? in ~talk

    bkimmel
    Link
    Who was the first guy who tried dairy and what the hell was he thinking?

    Who was the first guy who tried dairy and what the hell was he thinking?

    4 votes

  12. Comment on Question and tip thread for those looking to get into a new hobby in ~hobbies

    bkimmel
    Link
    I just picked up fly fishing - something I've avoided as a spincaster for almost my whole life, but I'm really enjoying the connection to nature and the focus on different aquatic insects hatches...

    I just picked up fly fishing - something I've avoided as a spincaster for almost my whole life, but I'm really enjoying the connection to nature and the focus on different aquatic insects hatches and how to match them with the right fly and the right presentation. The focus on improving environmental quality for native fish is also something that drew me into the sport.

    I'm currently working on improving my cast: I got the Clearwater 9' 5wt rod everyone gets to start with from Orvis and I've improved a lot but still trying to get consistent with casts over 20' or so. I've found a few good videos on YouTube with casting tips but any beginner tips would be appreciated.

    Being out on the water with the fly rod feels amazing - it's therapy on a stick. One of the best things about fly fishing that I heard a podcaster say is that "trout just live in beautiful places" - they demand clear, cold pristine mountain streams so they tend to put you in beautiful relaxing places as a result when you go angling for them.

    4 votes

  13. Comment on What media have you found that teaches something in a fun or unique way? in ~life

    bkimmel
    (edited )
    Link
    https://youtu.be/PloqDBK0nBY?si=0iIkBCpgIJInV4Tc I saw this a while back, and I'm pretty sure you could come to this having never caught a fish in your life but leave with a pretty solid...

    https://youtu.be/PloqDBK0nBY?si=0iIkBCpgIJInV4Tc

    I saw this a while back, and I'm pretty sure you could come to this having never caught a fish in your life but leave with a pretty solid understanding of how to catch catfish. I really like how he showed the basics if each rig, explained the tradeoffs clearly and showed how they work underwater.

    Edit: should indicate that this video contains images of small live bait fish attached to the rigs. Not something that would be disturbing if you fish regularly but mentioning anyway just to be safe.

    5 votes

  14. Comment on How are you preparing for a fascist America? in ~society

    bkimmel
    Link Parent
    The Khmer Rouge was predicated (iirc) on an open and wholesale rejection of modernity and a return to an almost entirely agrarian society. While there may be shadows of Pol Pot in the MAGA...

    The Khmer Rouge was predicated (iirc) on an open and wholesale rejection of modernity and a return to an almost entirely agrarian society. While there may be shadows of Pol Pot in the MAGA rejection of certain things (vaccines comes to mind) I don't know if your rank-and-file MAGA really wants to wind back the clock that far but that period is certainly instructive (in a very dark way) about how brutal people will treat their neighbors for purely ideological reasons. It's scary as hell to think about.

    2 votes

  15. Comment on How are you preparing for a fascist America? in ~society

    bkimmel
    Link Parent
    Just some other stories from neighbors; Couple down the street from Colombia and Puerto Rico almost cancelled their trip to Puerto Rico (which is even a US territory). They're still going but...

    Just some other stories from neighbors;

    Couple down the street from Colombia and Puerto Rico almost cancelled their trip to Puerto Rico (which is even a US territory). They're still going but bringing passports for the whole family just in case.

    Next door neighbor is white but his wife and kids are Indian. He's always been anti-gun in every way but last week he showed me his new handgun he bought in case someone tried to take his kids.

    None of this is normal.

    19 votes

  16. Comment on How are you preparing for a fascist America? in ~society

    bkimmel
    Link
    We ordered passports for the kids. Started reading some books on Milosovic / collapse of Yugoslavia in the mid/late 90s since I think that's the closest parallel to the situation in the U.S. First...

    We ordered passports for the kids. Started reading some books on Milosovic / collapse of Yugoslavia in the mid/late 90s since I think that's the closest parallel to the situation in the U.S.

    First move is to book it for the Canadian border, I guess and maybe on to Ireland or something from there (my company has an office in Dublin).

    I'm a former employee of the DNC, so trying to figure out where my name would be on "the lists" is something I'm thinking about.

    13 votes

  17. Comment on Temu and Shein are raising their US prices next week in ~finance

    bkimmel
    Link Parent
    Thank you, yes. To put a finer point on it: "When you choose to do nothing on issues that stand to benefit a majority of the electorate for a long time, this is what happens in the end." I hadn't...

    Thank you, yes. To put a finer point on it: "When you choose to do nothing on issues that stand to benefit a majority of the electorate for a long time, this is what happens in the end."

    I hadn't considered the notion that rolling back civil rights would be a real benefit to anyone (although that's certainly being done right now for political reasons that benefit no one IMHO but that's another topic). Which forms a corollary: "The civil rights things you care about will also be nuked if you choose to ignore these kinds of sensible policy issues."

    "Sensible trade policy" was a thing we could have done since (really) the Carter administration and chose not to for the sake of "money from big donors". It was compatible with our ideals (labor, environment) unlike repealing civil rights (which is not) but we just chose to do nothing for like 50 years except tell people they were too stupid to understand how competing with child slaves in China was "actually good for them".

    Now we're where we are.

    1 vote

  18. Comment on Temu and Shein are raising their US prices next week in ~finance

    bkimmel
    Link Parent
    As one of the Democrats arguing for "sensible trade controls" for 30 years and being ignored (at best) I hope this is one of the big lessons the party takes from this: If you don't choose to do...

    As one of the Democrats arguing for "sensible trade controls" for 30 years and being ignored (at best) I hope this is one of the big lessons the party takes from this: If you don't choose to do things a sensible way when you have the opportunity they will certainly be done in a bad destructive way eventually and you can't really complain when that happens.

    1 vote

  19. Comment on What's a secondhand heartbreak you've experienced? in ~talk

    bkimmel
    Link
    In high school one of my close friends and I sort of "fenced" at the top of our class for who was the "smartest kid in our grade". I tended to edge him out in English/History and he was a lot...

    In high school one of my close friends and I sort of "fenced" at the top of our class for who was the "smartest kid in our grade". I tended to edge him out in English/History and he was a lot better than me at Math and Science generally speaking. On paper, he was the valedictorian and I was generally more of the party/drinking guy so as we got later into high school he pulled ahead in most of the things you could put on a college application. He applied to Harvard our Junior year and everyone just sort of assumed he would get in: His record was unimpeachable in every imaginable way.

    When he got rejected, I think I took it harder than he did. I never had any intention of going there, but it really felt like they were passing judgment on me, vicariously.

    From that point on, I started to really dislike that school. The recent news where they told the Trump admin where to shove it is honestly the first positive thought I've had about that institution in like 30 years.

    7 votes

  20. Comment on United Auto Workers statement: In a victory for autoworkers, auto tariffs mark the beginning of the end of NAFTA and the ā€œfree tradeā€ disaster in ~society

    bkimmel
    Link Parent
    The root of the problem, as I see it, is that this statement is "basically true": competing against "practical slavery" in China - not to mention the absolute flouting of environmental laws - is...

    The root of the problem, as I see it, is that this statement is "basically true": competing against "practical slavery" in China - not to mention the absolute flouting of environmental laws - is not good for American workers. 3 successive Democratic administration have done absolutely nothing about it (or if they did, like NAFTA, they made it worse). They could have done this the "right way" for 40 years and they chose to take big money donations instead and talk out the side of their mouths about "competitiveness" or throw crumbs like the CHIPS act on the ground... So now we're doing it "this way", which sucks but was inevitable.

    14 votes