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Comment · 2 years ago
Reading this article I find it hard to believe an editor is involved in the process at Atlas Obscura. There have been several articles like this posted even ones that are completely fictional accounts on the website. The way this article is written it intentionally downplays real dangers of prion disease in an attempt to defend its consumption. This isn't something a magazine should be doing in the first place. I don't know what the review process there is but it's clear it doesn't seem to exist.
Comment · 2 years ago
I thought this was satire when I clicked on it. The more I read it got progressively worse as I realized how long it took to even mention prion disease. This article doesn't really seem reviewed which seems to be a trend I'm noticing in Atlas Obscura articles. Is anyone else thinking this?

Edit: The person who wrote this article has no background at all in Food Safety, nor should they really be talking about this subject so lightly. Honestly, this article is dangerous to even really promote in the way its written. They lightly jester at that idea that a 1% fatality rate is an extremely rare occurrence and suggests that brains should be consumed in higher amounts. At first I thought this was satire but this advice is just genuinely harmful.

Comment · 2 years ago
I don't think that this was reviewed by anyone. It seems like it's just a like thing he posts himself. Looking at his youtube videos it seems he's doing this as a side hustle. Typical click bait videos with little to no real weight to them. It's disappointing to see but it's pretty normal on youtube. You'll find people speculating on the most insane things like the entire downfall of nations because of X event. This sort of just looks like an extension of that.
Comment · 2 years ago
This doesn't really factor a lot of things. It's a bit too simplified in my opinion. There's nothing here about costs involved, labor, and technological shift which frankly, isn't really possible for a lot of countries. A part of me doesn't really trust this post as there isn't really much it cites as its source. If I saw the graph he was showing at a glance I really wouldn't believe what he was saying unless he could back it up with the data, which he doesn't do.
Comment · 2 years ago
Uhh...

Researchers also found that Black and Hispanic families lost a higher percentage of their wages than white families. By 2019, health care premiums as percentage of compensation were 18.5% for Asian families, 19.2% for Black families, and 19.8% for Hispanic families, compared to 13.8% for white families.

Lower-wage workers are also hit hard by this disparity. In 2019, health care premiums as percentage of compensation represented 28.5% of compensation for families in the 20th percentile of earnings, compared with only 3.9% for families in the 95th percentile.

Maybe not the one you want to skip the article for. On another note Asian Americans are skinnier than White Americans even adjusted for on BMI so obesity is ruled out.

Comment · 2 years ago
Hmm... 2006, huh. I wonder what happened then for it to change. Well tax evasion has always been the main game with these foundations. But it's a strange statement from earlier about the disbursement of funds through the Gates Foundation. There are claims here against Dynastic wealth yet similarly to the Emerson Collective these claims seem hard to substantiate or just tax write off donations to his children. Though it is important to note that Buffet has given $50 billion of his own wealth to charitable causes.

Personally, I don't like to think of this as some conspiracy or oligarchic cause. In many ways it could be the billions his children are inheriting seems like a lot because it is. Though, mind you, they are in their 70s. Some are obese, the likelihood of living past a certain age is also hard to factor, but not impossible. Most people like to see their children at least live a good life, it's hard to blame them for it. But at what amount does this become questionable? These are all questions people ask and have asked over the decades.

This generation of billionaires have not been born into extreme levels of wealth. Though many have asked what would happen if this were to continue. In Korea generational wealth has existed through various families known as the Chaebols the word itself is a loan word for Japanese known as Zaibatsu. Extreme levels of income inequality in Korea and an economy controlled by a few powerful mega-corporations whose families made connections to one another through marriage.

Well, it's impossible to tell what the future holds for these children. But for the average Korean citizen they have become indentured servants. A broken social structure and a ladder that for many is impossible to climb. I guess it's enough with the anecdotes. And even if it got better should a family or a handful of families control an entire countries economy? I don't think so.

I do wonder though, can a family spend even a billion dollars in their lifetime? It seems unrealistic to think of that way. And why should any family even have control of such level of wealth. In their lifespan have they done anything to deserve this amount? It seems impossible to think of, much less inheriting it.

It can seem appealing to people to be a billionaire or to have an immense amount of wealth, but it's not. It's an isolating life and an even smaller social circle. Most of no friends and it can be almost impossible to build relationships with others even in these circles. But who knows maybe they've never experienced this before. But I've met with aging billionaires before and their children. Their life stories are just kind of depressing. For a lot of them their money is the only tangible thing they have and that's not really a healthy thing.

Comment · 2 years ago
Well I can't edit this and this page has likely been archived so... I'll just write this. Sam was essentially homeless. A failed startup with not much to it. Sure, it was acquired but it gave him essentially just enough to continue trying to pursue his dream. He really didn't make any progress at all. At YCombinator he was essentially stuck for years. There's a lot of fake and editorialized stories about his life and his made up genius. The dude dropped out of college it's not this amazing story. Mentally he had given up everything to try to reach this stage. I don't know the full story but almost everything online I've read is completely different from what I've actually heard.
Comment · 2 years ago
Huh the things I heard about Altman a long time before was that he was a couch surfer at YCombinator.
Comment · 3 years ago
None of the people I've described have been forced to learn these skills. Well, not in the practical sense. Here is an example. You an born in a Tibetan Monastery in front of you is a set of items, the items that you pick are the ones that you will follow for the rest of your life. A child in this scenario is never forced into an option. Instead, the option just does not exist. From birth you are encourages and taught about the wonders of a skill that you will learn for the rest of you life. Of course you aren't being forced. But wouldn't it be fun if you could learn just a bit more? Oh friends? What friends? The people that the departments I've had the opportunity to interact with deal with these kinds of people. These children are never forced explicitly. It can have later in life too. 12 or 13 this is around the age for many sports and athletes. It's not a talent or passion, what you think exists doesn't.
Comment · 3 years ago
Honestly at 16 even if a child reached this skill level it means they typically sacrificed other aspects of there life to reach it. Realistically less than 0.1% of children reach this route and from I've seen it's due to "encouragement" by their parents. I've seen a wide range of people children who had have "gone" far. Kids who finished their PhDs by the age of 16. It's almost always child abuse. There parents don't necessarily hit them. But they "encourage" them by forcing them down a path because it's "good" for them. If you're thinking of going this route, don't. The professors I've talked to kind of just see this as abuse and they will not help these children.
Comment · 3 years ago
You're showing the winners not the nominee's its pretty clear what's going on here.
Comment · 3 years ago
Huh, looking at the other nominees a part of me wonders if it was created by someone else and they just had a child stand in to take the credit. This is incredibly suspicious to say the least but who knows. There's nothing wrong with a parent or someone else helping them but to the extent of this...
Comment · 3 years ago
It's a skinners box. People will put money in for the dopamine rush it gives. Think candy crush or vampire stories. They're paying for an experience. In a sense the people spending money are victims of predatory gaming mechanics.

If you've payed for anything in any video game to enhance your experience like getting an upgraded weapon it's the same exact thing. Turns out there's an audience that's willing to pay this money. Or it's a money laundering scheme but who really knows.

Comment · 3 years ago
I genuinely thought this was satire when I clicked on it. Honestly the -punk genre itself to me doesn't really make any sense. There is little to no real connection between punk genres with the notable exception of Cyberpunk and Biopunk and even those don't necessarily have much in common.

Personally I think it's great to see more american culture in novels but I feel like this is a stretch. It requires too much information for a writer to have knowledge of. There's a lot of faults and issues with modern day writing and the publishing industry as whole. But I just think it's getting ridiculous that we're expecting new and upcoming writers to be able to do all of these things in order to fit into possible niche genres that generate little to no profit. Honestly, a part of me is concerned this is a way for publishing companies to silo young and upcoming ethnic writers. I think it's great that we're trying to be more inclusionary but I don't think this is the way to do it.

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