EPTAsk and answer stupid questions here! - Page 480
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Khalum
Austria831 Posts
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Thieving Magpie
United States6752 Posts
On July 28 2016 16:19 OtherWorld wrote: What I'm telling you is that even through "cheap" public transports (which are only cheap because they operate at a loss), there are corporations making profits by selling buses etc to the cities. Thus wjhile public transit is cheap because it's intended to be cheap, it has nothing to do with mass transit, it's just policies. You could imagine cars belonging to the city and being rented to citiizens for very cheap. Companies who sells buses/cars/trains to the government also sell those same things to industry and are hence usually part of the Big Oil/Automotive lobbies more than they are part of the "Public Transit Lobby" The truth is that unless you build a city to be better for public transport than it is for cars (for example, making parking illegal) then you will always have people who would rather spend money on cars than spend taxes on public transport. | ||
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FiWiFaKi
Canada9859 Posts
1) Cars, get anywhere, with current oil prices in Alberta, transportation costs are $1 for 15km~ depending on the car. Add a $1500/year for insurance, and $1000-$3000 dollars/year for a car if you're not after something fancy. Absolutely necessary if you'd like to go anywhere outside of the city, current private bus prices to go to the mountains from here are more expensive than the cost of gas. The big negative for cars is parking is hella expensive in downtown or university, and you'll be paying $300-$700/month. 2) Transit... Everything takes so fucking long. We have a reasonable system with many buses and several LRT lines, but generally speaking, getting anywhere in the city will take you 3-4x longer with transit than with a car. Cost is $100 a month for a pass (or $3.15 for one ticket), so if you only park in free places, and buy a cheap $5000 dollar car and drive 20,000km/year, a car is really only 3x or so more expensive than using public transit. Really, the only advantage to a bus is free parking. It's inconvenient having to be surrounded by smoked up people, drunk people, sick people, not have place to sit when it's busy, can't carry a lot of luggage, etc. 3) Cycling. The most underrated form of transportation. My city is larger than NYC in terms of area, and I can get to anywhere in the city quicker on my bike than on public transit. No insurance, no gas, just a good bike and the gear. Roughly takes twice as long to get to places compared to a car within the city, and disadvantages are biking in snow/rain/cold, hard to carry a lot of things with you, get sweaty, and I guess tired if you're inexperienced. Helps with healthy living and gives the freedom to go where you want to go just like a car. 4) Car2Go, a system that tackles the issue of like you said, a car is only used 1-4 hours a day, how wasteful. Has it's own issues, as there is a middleman to pay, there is the issue of moral hazard, so people don't take care of the car as they would of their own. The car is not next to your house, so often you need to go find it, and it's also only allowed in a limited range within the city, so again, you can't go on any out of city trips. Plus, you're at all times monitored by a camera there, GPS tracking, among other things, so if you fancy some car sex, probably not. 5) Uber, a taxi with no middleman, great service, issues with insurance and whatnot, so government don't like it, and particularly the cab companies. Like taxis, very expensive compared to a car, and completely impractical for everyday use. Also has the inconvenience of not being instant, and location limited. Advantages are you don't have to do the driving obviously while you still get the comfort of a car. 6) Taxi, see above, just more expensive. And that's really all there is. Cars are clearly the far superior choice, and there's no way we will get away from it.The freedom and convenience is just too much, anything path based, like hyperloops, maglevs, buses, trams, monorails, etc will never suffice for some people. So to be able to replace cars, you'd truly need a system that has as much freedom to go anywhere as a car, because even if you use a bus sometimes, there remains a need to use cars sometimes.Nothing that I can think of anyway, you'll always need roads for cars. The best you can do is like someone else said, have the city planned from the start, and integrate a very good transportation system into it, the ideal would be a metro, but it's really expensive. I have no doubt that a good system would allow you to get anywhere in the city within 45 minutes (have an underground metro circle that goes around downtown, 8-12 stops around the circle, travelling at 250km/h~, from those stops have 4-6 lines that connect those stops and go roughly in a straight line into downtown and back to the other end of the circle, travelling at 100-120km/hr~, and then several bus routes from each of those 8-12 circle stops, and an additional small metro for the downtown area. With this system, you'd have it never take more than 5-10 minutes to walk from any metro stop to your destination near the downtown and surrounding area, and yeah, it'd work well, just be very expensive, as I believe metros are $50mil dollars /km. Roads are a very cheap transportation system compared to anything else. I think the thing that has the biggest future is electric helicopter/quadcopter transportation vehicles. Small size, say 2000kgs, and the beauty here is, requires no transportation infrastructure. I view the current progress as gasoline car -> self driving car -> self-driving electric quadcopter. | ||
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Djzapz
Canada10681 Posts
An article about this goes: "A jury convicted Forcillo of attempted murder for firing the second set of shots, but acquitted him of second-degree murder for the first volley, which an autopsy concluded actually caused Yatim’s death." He fired two volleys, somehow the first one was tied to the second-degree murder charges, and the second volley was tied to the attempted murder charge? How the fuck you you get convicted of attempted murder when you 1) actually killed the guy and 2) they were deemed to be unnecessary, so where the first volley may have been some sort of self defense, the second volley is more akin to second degree murder. But mostly: how the fuck do you get convicted of attempted murder if the attempt was successful. It's no longer attempted, ffs. This is ridiculous. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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Sent.
Poland9299 Posts
This situation is unique because the murderer and failed murderer is the same person but it makes perfect sense legally. I assume the victim was still alive (but dying) when the cop fired the second volley, you can't murder a dead man. | ||
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Djzapz
Canada10681 Posts
On July 29 2016 05:18 FiWiFaKi wrote: The best you can do is like someone else said, have the city planned from the start, and integrate a very good transportation system into it, the ideal would be a metro, but it's really expensive. I have no doubt that a good system would allow you to get anywhere in the city within 45 minutes (have an underground metro circle that goes around downtown, 8-12 stops around the circle, travelling at 250km/h~, from those stops have 4-6 lines that connect those stops and go roughly in a straight line into downtown and back to the other end of the circle, travelling at 100-120km/hr~, and then several bus routes from each of those 8-12 circle stops, and an additional small metro for the downtown area. With this system, you'd have it never take more than 5-10 minutes to walk from any metro stop to your destination near the downtown and surrounding area, and yeah, it'd work well, just be very expensive, as I believe metros are $50mil dollars /km. Roads are a very cheap transportation system compared to anything else. I think the thing that has the biggest future is electric helicopter/quadcopter transportation vehicles. Small size, say 2000kgs, and the beauty here is, requires no transportation infrastructure. I view the current progress as gasoline car -> self driving car -> self-driving electric quadcopter. Barring cities planned from the start around the mobility needs of today's urban regions (just about none of the major cities managed to be built optimally), one recent development in urban planning is the notion of Transit-oriented developments (TODs) which essentially try to maximize residential density, proximity (usually walking and cycling distances) to commercial areas for shopping as well as public transit options. So until new cities are build from the ground with transit in mind, the best thing they can do is to develop those little microcosms to prevent the need for driving around all over the place. One massive structural problem that every city experiences and it a big cause of traffic across the board is that there's often a mismatch between residential areas and where people work. Not only do the people commute from the suburbs to downtown, but people from the city trade places. For instance, some of the tech firms in my city are located in relatively poor areas, so the tech guys making 120k a year don't want to live there. Then there's the streets themselves, which realistically should accommodate cyclists. There's the road signalization that's very bad for both cyclists and pedestrians in many cities, too, discouraging those people and "forcing" many to take their cars, adding to traffic. Giving other options to car users who live close enough to work to walk or cycle there is hugely important these days. | ||
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Djzapz
Canada10681 Posts
On July 29 2016 05:41 Sent. wrote: It's not ridiculous (well, the situation is ridiculous but not the verdict). His attempt was not successful because it didn't cause the victim's death. It's like when you poison someone and then someone tries and fails to kill him. You're still responsible for the murder even though someone else tried to kill him after your actions. This situation is unique because the murderer and failed murderer is the same person but it makes perfect sense legally. I assume the victim was still alive (but dying) when the cop fired the second volley, you can't murder a dead man. I don't know that it makes sense legally. If it does then the law is in dire need of a review because if you shoot a guy who's dead or dying and you're the cause of that, but those shots don't kill the person because he's already dead or dying, it suggests to me like your first shots may actually be less innocent than it may have seemed. Seems like the second volley informs us a bit about the first. The person is willing to shoot at a dying man, but somehow we should believe that his intentions were reasonable with the first volley? This is why many people think the legal system is rigged and it's bullshit. "Attempted murder for killing a dude, but attempted because at the time of some of the shots, the guy was already dead or dying enough that it doesn't count." What a load of shit. He'll be out in 3 years for essentially executing a mentally troubled 18 year old. | ||
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OtherWorld
France17333 Posts
On July 28 2016 16:30 mantequilla wrote: public transport takes you from one central point to another but usually you have to walk to reach your exact destination. That walks add up to an uncomfortable length sometimes. In a day I have to both go to school and work (home > school > work > home) I end up walking 7km and I use all available public transport options. For bikes to be practical you need proper bike roads and a mild + little rain climate. I don't like cars as an engineer but they have some points. I'll add that you have to adapt to public transports' schedule, instead of the transport adapting to your schedule (bike, walk, car), and that makes them innefficient sometimes. For example, to go to my university, I have a 15-minute walk to do, or if I take the tram, it'll take me 5 minutes of tram and 2 minutes of walk (7 minutes total). But, since there's only a tram every 7/8 minutes, I oftentimes find it more efficient to do the 15-minute walk : I'll lose 2 or 3 minutes, but I can enjoy the outside air and not be confined in an vehicle with 4 people per m². Meanwhile, if I took my car, I could be there in 5 to 10 minutes depending on traffic. | ||
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Sent.
Poland9299 Posts
On July 29 2016 05:53 Djzapz wrote: I don't know that it makes sense legally. If it does then the law is in dire need of a review because if you shoot a guy who's dead or dying and you're the cause of that, but those shots don't kill the person because he's already dead or dying, it suggests to me like your first shots may actually be less innocent than it may have seemed. Seems like the second volley informs us a bit about the first. The person is willing to shoot at a dying man, but somehow we should believe that his intentions were reasonable with the first volley? This is why many people think the legal system is rigged and it's bullshit. "Attempted murder for killing a dude, but attempted because at the time of some of the shots, the guy was already dead or dying enough that it doesn't count." What a load of shit. He'll be out in 3 years for essentially executing a mentally troubled 18 year old. Imagine a different situation. There is a guy you hate and want dead. One day that guy comes to your house and tries to kill you. Luckily you had a gun and shot him in the stomach in self-defense. He's dying. You hate him and you're happy that he's dying but clearly you're not responsible for first-degree murder. You then decide to shoot him again to make sure he'll die but it turns out your gun is empty. The guy bleeds out and dies. You're still not responsible for first-degree murder. | ||
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Djzapz
Canada10681 Posts
On July 29 2016 06:20 Sent. wrote: Imagine a different situation. There is a guy you hate and want dead. One day that guy comes to your house and tries to kill you. Luckily you had a gun and shot him in the stomach in self-defense. He's dying. You hate him and you're happy that he's dying but clearly you're not responsible for first-degree murder. You then decide to shoot him again to make sure he'll die but it turns out your gun is empty. The guy bleeds out and dies. You're still not responsible for first-degree murder. I understand that. Yet as far as I'm concerned it takes some wild mental gymnastics to dissociate the two when they're committed by the same person. What's the reasoning, this is a perfectly reasonable person who shot at a cadaver so it's an attempted murder in a vacuum? He shot a guy, wanted to make sure he was really dead, and we manage to be complete fucking imbeciles and see those two things as separate incidents that have no link between the two. | ||
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Sent.
Poland9299 Posts
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farvacola
United States18857 Posts
For as powerful, serious, and all-encompassing as the law can seem, the whole thing is sort of a reductionist mess that doesn't know how silly it can be, but it is the best we have, I think. | ||
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TMagpie
265 Posts
Car is more expensive Public car is most expensive ----- Lots of people pick car because they're rich enough to have that privilege. | ||
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GreenHorizons
United States23957 Posts
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xM(Z
Romania5299 Posts
On July 29 2016 13:17 GreenHorizons wrote: What's the deal with unisex names in Germany and other parts of Europe? they mostly don't exist?, except some nicknames. Germany had, by law, names linked with sex until 2008; the custom lived on?... | ||
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Velr
Switzerland10884 Posts
On July 29 2016 13:17 GreenHorizons wrote: What's the deal with unisex names in Germany and other parts of Europe? Uhm? Any examples? Andrea comes to my mind, but thats italian... | ||
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Cascade
Australia5405 Posts
On July 29 2016 16:11 Velr wrote: Uhm? Any examples? Andrea comes to my mind, but thats italian... The most common thing I can think of is Chris, that seems to be used as short for both Christopher and Christine. But that's here in Australia... I guess they do the same in US and UK? I've never heard it in Sweden where I grew up. | ||
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OtherWorld
France17333 Posts
On July 29 2016 13:17 GreenHorizons wrote: What's the deal with unisex names in Germany and other parts of Europe? Well, they exist, and most of the time it's not "new" or "modern" names. Examples that come to my mind in French are Camille, Pascal(e), Morgan(e), André(e). | ||
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Dan HH
Romania9208 Posts
On July 29 2016 16:25 OtherWorld wrote: Well, they exist, and most of the time it's not "new" or "modern" names. Examples that come to my mind in French are Camille, Pascal(e), Morgan(e), André(e). I wouldn't call those unisex names other than Camille, since they have gender based differences. They're no different than Stephen/Stephanie, Paul/Paula and so on. Not sure what names he's talking about, but the question implies that it's a different convention than in Anglo places. | ||
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