Yeah... I would put a lot more stock in that quote if Kamala Harris' poll numbers among Black women weren't relatively low for a Democrat. I'm sure some people will be upset, but if she is picked I know a lot of people will consider that a slap in the face in another way. Polls have shown for a long time that she's unpopular in a way that has nothing to do with race or gender. It would be handing the election to Trump almost as certainly as running Biden.

I'm curious what the temperature resiliency is for sodium-ion batteries. I had a power outage recently where I was relying on a lithium-ion battery. As the temperature in the house plunged, it because so inefficient that charging a single phone overnight drained a quarter of the battery.

Points I found interesting:

• AI is being used to create kill lists. A human must still approve strikes, but it's unclear how much vetting is really going on.
• A civilian casualty rate of 15-20 for a rank-and-file Hamas fighter is considered acceptable. 100 is considered acceptable for a battalion or brigade commander. Contrast this with the US's rate for Saddam Hussein, 30. He was of course found hiding in a hole.
• It's not clear that military commanders understand AI's weaknesses in depth.
• Israeli soldiers have reported that some commanders have set a policy of considering any adult male in their sector to be a "terrorist" and to be shot on sight, completely outside the use of AI. This is a violation of the laws of war.
• During the US occupation of Afghanistan, it used AI on phone calls. The problem is this could conceivably pick up on someone like an innocent bike courier.
• The US used computers to detect troop movements along the Ho Chi Min Trail during the Vietnam War. That allowed for extremely fast bombing, racking up a huge body count. Israel should take note of the disconnect between body count and winning.

I remember being on the hiring committee for my new manager. One of the two finalist candidates took several times longer than necessary to answer the questions without adding substance. When we met to discuss our decision, most committee members tried to voice more substantive reasons. Finally someone just cut the shit and said something like "it sounds like no one wants to listen to him talk." So yes, yammering is an excellent people repellent.

At its best, nationalism in some forms can help unify people from disparate backgrounds into an imagined national identity. Unfortunately, most nationalism rots into division instead. Christian nationalism in the US, Hindu nationalism in India, Nazis in Germany. These all reject members of the physical nation in favor of their crazed fantasy version.

There's a reason we have a tool called git blame.

Yes, and under the hoodies there are t-shirts that were given out at conferences. That or memes. Strict.

One exception is one particular chef knife. Most cheap knives you get what you pay for. But there is one, the Victorinox Classic Chef Knife, that is around $30 but is competitive in comfort and sharpness with very expensive knives.

Edit: I was incorrect on the model, it's the Fibrox Pro 8" Chef’s Knife.

Civic Science

https://www.iflscience.com/56-percent-of-americans-dont-think-we-should-teach-arabic-numerals-in-school-52484

They openly admit that they were trying to mislead surveyed people with their wording. These results were taken as tribalism on both sides:

Should schools in America teach the creation theory of Catholic priest Georges Lamaitre as part of their science curriculum?

The results were 20% yes, 53% no, 27% no opinion. Turns out the "creation theory" in question was the Big Bang Theory. No one calls the Big Bang Theory a "creation theory". Overall, I'd call this a shit poll that isn't good for anything beyond a chance to clutch at pearls.

Edit: How could I miss it! It's a troll poll!

Oof. At work we currently have a project for words deemed insensitive. For the most part I think it's worthy, but some things are overboard. The project group cast a very wide net, ignoring context and etymology. My biggest disagreement is over "black" and "white".

Take "black box" and "white box" for types of testing. These are based merely on the properties of light. I have serious doubts about anyone ever having felt excluded by their use. And yet, we're wasting time coming up with non-standard nomenclature to satisfy this supposed slight. There's a whole laundry list of words like this.

Writing notes for myself to remind me to do something. The problem is that I don't remember to look at the notes. What's happening is that people are telling me advice that worked for them. That's very nice of them to try, but when I've tried similar systems for decades and they always fail, it's time to try something new.

The US has had a transcontinental railroad network for over a century. The Western US was initially settled largely on railway stops, land grants, and mandatory passenger service. The passenger service was one of the conditions for the land grants.