Recent submissions

Comment · 1 year ago
The fact that the two highest profile examples of starvation in Gaza have confounding conditions makes me suspect otherwise. If it is as widespread as feared, it should be easier to find pictures of starving Gazans than fat Gazans.

It is notable that in the same famous photo of the emaciated Mohammed Zakaria al‑Mutawaq in the NYT article, his not-malnourished looking brother Joud was cropped out. And their mother is not emaciated. Is she supposed to be starving her younger child to feed herself and her other son? To me this is evidence of press cooperation with a propaganda campaign.

I submit that if you find either side in this propaganda war to be credible by default, you do the other side a disservice.

Comment · 1 year ago
Blown up hospitals can be secondary to firing rockets from the parking lot and using them as ammo dumps and military headquarters. You can take this line of reasoning back to the big bang without addressing the quality of evidence of a severe food shortage.
Comment · 2 years ago
“Automakers have been making hybrids long enough that they’ve gotten really good at it. Plus, many hybrids are also made by manufacturers that tend to produce reliable vehicles overall, such as Toyota, Hyundai, and Kia.”

It's anti-intuitive that hybrids would be more reliable than pure ICE cars. But it would be explained by this if hybrids are somewhat less reliable than the ICE cars from these three makers. Presumably Consumer Reports has that data ...

For the big picture you need to compare the relative reliability of components after X million have been built. I would be surprised if the reliability of EV tech hasn't improved faster just because it has developed more recently.

Comment · 2 years ago
I agree that it shouldn't be used for anything complex, even if it reduces to one line. But I do like it for simple things. Maybe it's staring at very similar code all day, but such short statements read fluently for me.

And even if an extra line of separation is used, it's still 6 lines instead of 11.

Comment · 2 years ago
Just 12 years full time with Ruby here, I'm a noob. But when I see that I could replace

  def initialize(text)
    @text = text
  end

  def inspect
    "#<#{self.class} #{text}>"
  end

  def ==(other)
    other.is_a?(Word) && text == other.text
  end
with

  def initialize(text) = @text = text
  def inspect = "#<#{self.class} #{text}>"
  def ==(other) = other.is_a?(Word) && text == other.text
I start drooling a little. That's 3 lines to replace 11. We have a soft limit on class length of 100 lines, and I like the extra conciseness this allows.

You can also do it like

  define_method(:inspect) { |text| "#<#{self.class} #{text}>" }
and we do that in some places, but that extra verbosity makes for more lines.
Comment · 2 years ago
In other words, to get your mass emails read, mimic personal emails more closely. It's a hack to use our noise filters against us. It's not exactly a dark pattern, even if it does make it a little harder for us to distinguish the signal.
Comment · 2 years ago
Comment · 2 years ago
Comment · 2 years ago
> Kissinger saw combat with the [84th Infantry Division] and volunteered for hazardous intelligence duties during the Battle of the Bulge.

Thank you for your military service Mr. Secretary. Fighting real Nazis earns my gratitude.

Comment · 2 years ago
When you hire according to which candidate has worked hardest to fight against oppression, it isn't surprising when their academic work is about gathering evidence for the fight against oppression.

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