Yes, we could do that, but we never do. Why is that, I wonder? Probably because those brutal dictators aren't sitting on lots of oil.
Besides, even if you take out a brutal dictator and his minions, that'll just leave a power vacuum and someone else just as bad will probably fill it. I wouldn't let that stop me if I were a (benevolent) dictator and had drones at my disposal, but with democratic national governments sensitive to political scandals, they probably avoid stuff like that unless they have some really good reason to do it (like lobbyists wanting them to).
They don't seem to have any problem finding what they're looking for, so why should they settle for a guy like me?
What makes you think they're finding what they're looking for? I think the high divorce stats in this country prove the exact opposite. They're picking the shiny and glamorous, and then changing their minds later on. Then they find themselves 35+, divorced (because they just couldn't stand the guy any more, or he dumped her for some reason), and bitter.
The last thing I want to do is finally land one and then disappoint her.
No offense, but I think you need to work on your self-confidence. This is coming from someone who has his own issues with that, so you're not alone.
and I would be suspicious of their sincerity anyway.
That's very wise. Leaving the country isn't that easy (unless you go to a 3rd-world cesspit), but if you have valuable tech skills it can be done pretty easily.
If you haven't had a girlfriend by 31, I don't think the future looks too bright for you in the relationship department. Have you tried online dating?
Maybe you should think about leaving the country; you'd probably do better in a different culture. American culture sucks in a lot of ways, especially at younger ages where women have horrible criteria for selecting male partners.
I was raised by a single mother who adopted me, and my perspective is that it's horribly selfish. Children need to grow up with multiple adults, so they can see adults in real relationships, and also so they have someone around when they're young, rather than being around abusive babysitters and their boyfriends, or being latchkey kids who are alone most of the time.
Don't be a single mother by choice. Think about the life your kid is going to have.
The only problem I have with this idea is: the number of housing units in the country has not decreased, instead it's constantly increasing. The population is increasing too, but not at an astronomical rate. So it's not like housing is getting hard to find, however the costs are obviously rising greatly.
So why is this? Is the housing all being bought up by someone so the prices are inflated?
If $country has a declining population, then just open up the immigration flood gates and let the populations equalize. Or do you only want to be surrounded with people who look/act/think like you?
Actually, yes. Is there something wrong with wanting to only be around people I like, and not around people who irritate me with customs and values I don't share and don't really appreciate?
If you disagree, why don't you go live in rural Alabama for a while and get to know the locals there? Or some other part of the Bible Belt where most of the people are fundamentalists? Or better yet, someplace in rural Idaho that's dominated by white supremacists? What, are you now saying you don't want to be surrounded with just any random people, and that you actually prefer some cultures to others? How racist!
Famine in most parts of the world are a political problem, not a resource problem. There isn't much that can be done about political problems; you can either let them play out on their own, or you can send the Army in to intervene and set up a new government. In the former case, you get criticized for allowing atrocities to happen. In the latter case, you get criticized for stealing that area's natural resources and setting up a puppet government. Either way, the outcome is always bad.
What are you talking about? It's not at all uncommon for married couples to have two cars which are wildly different from each other. Haven't you seen couples where the wife drives some nice, new(er), fancy car, and the husband drives some old POS beater to work? Or where one drives a small econo or sporty car, and the other drives a van or SUV? Why wouldn't it be normal for (while EVs still have limited range and recharging on trips is a PITA) couples to have one nice EV for driving around town, and one possibly somewhat older gas car for the occasional long trip and for one of the partners to drive?
Or, they could have 2 EVs, and a third gas car reserved solely for longer trips. It's not that uncommon for families to have a third car. I knew a bunch of middle-class families while growing up who had three, one rarely used. Or, people could just rent a car. How often do you drive that far away anyway? A few times a year? Enterprise will even bring your rental car to you.
Unless everyone is stupid. Which is admittedly an option when it comes to essential US infrastructure.
It's not just an possibility, it's a certainty if American Slashdotters are any indication. If our "tech nerds" are this backwards-thinking, I think it's safe to assume that the average American is dumber than a box of rocks when it comes to planning for the future.
You don't think people who can afford $75-100k for a car normally have two or more cars anyway? Single under-30 guys aren't Tesla's target market; the people who buy cars like this are older and married. Married people who can afford $100k cars do not make-do with a single car.
It's amazing how out-of-touch you Slashdotters are.
That's irrelevant. The issue is how much power you get with the available feeds. 220V has different feeds available than 110V, and much, much larger ones. With 110V, you're limited to 15A for most circuits, and 20A for some (like the one going to the washing machine). I don't think there's a such thing as a 30A 110V circuit in residential wiring. However, there's 30A and 50A (IIRC) feeds available with 220V. HVAC systems usually have large feeds like that available to them.
So with, for instance, a 30A feed, not only are you getting double the voltage, you're getting double the current of a normal 110V circuit, so that's 4 times the power.
Huh? Converting an automatic car to a manual transmission is almost never a good idea. You're much better off just selling it and buying another (used) model that has the stick-shift from the factory. There's way too many differences between them, especially with modern cars which likely have different engine computers. Even in older cars without the software factor it's a giant PITA.
The SmartCars are butt-ugly, however. And it too little cargo space. The Prius at least seats 4 and has a nice hatchback layout with tons of cargo space.
My $8k used Volvo is incredibly safe, comfortable, and enjoyable to drive, and didn't cost much more than you spend per year on your ridiculous car's maintenance.
1) iPads (and tablets in general) will dominate over PCs once they solve the printing and windows compatibility problem (reality: even the latest tablets suck for these tasks, but PCs are in decline while tablets sales are set to overtake overall PC sales).
Tablets are outselling PCs because people already have PCs, and they aren't replacing them every 2-3 years like they did 10-15 years ago. PCs aren't getting noticeably faster, and software isn't getting horribly slower the way it used to, so everyone's just keeping what they have. This doesn't mean PCs are "dying". Go look at cars driving by you on the road; you'll see lots of people driving cars 10+ years old, since cars last a long time now. Are cars "dying"?
but many folks would gladly give up one or all three of those current benefits for a car that can be bought without going to a dealer, accelerates like a bat out of hell and is smooth and silent and gets OTA software updates and support. Tesla intended to disrupt the market and looks like they're doing so very well.
This is exactly correct. Plus, in the transition period, with so many households being dual-vehicle, it's quite likely many/most EV buyers would also own a gas car, probably less used. They'd use the EV for daily stuff, and the gas car for long trips. You don't really need to be able to drive cross-country in an EV.
220V is better for several reasons; not only is it capable of higher currents (with US residential feeds), it's more efficient than 110V since 1) the voltage is higher so you get lower line losses and 2) you're not splitting 220V across a neutral tap on a transformer, and creating an unbalanced load.
1) One needs to be able to charge it quickly, perhaps with an upper limit of about 10 minutes or so,
You don't really need this. When you have an electric car, you plug it in at home and recharge it overnight. Or at work, or some other convenient charging station when you're around town, once these become more ubiquitous. I don't know about you, but I only commute about 30 miles per day. I seriously doubt many people commute more than 100 per day.
If you can afford a $65k-100k car, you very likely have a second car as well. If the second car is a gas car, as it likely is, you don't need extremely long range or fast charging times. Use the gas car for the occasional road trip, and use the Tesla (or other EV) for your daily errands and commutes.
But you're right, once those three points are hit, gas cars are done for. But even before that, there's a market, I think, for people who might want an EV as one of their cars, to use for commuting. If Tesla or someone else made a small, inexpensive (relatively) EV with 100 or 120-mile range, there might be a lot of buyers interested in getting that as their commuter car.
Re-Engineering the electric infrastructure around an alternative source of energy which we do not have.
We don't have electricity? What are you smoking?
This isn't like trying to build hydrogen fueling infrastructure, which Pres. Bush was all excited about in the early 2000s. You just plug into the local power grid.
I'm really ashamed to be part of the Slashdot community. You so-called "nerds" are a pathetic bunch of luddites; you're just like buggy engineers who poo-pooed the then-new automobiles.
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, we could do that, but we never do. Why is that, I wonder? Probably because those brutal dictators aren't sitting on lots of oil.
Besides, even if you take out a brutal dictator and his minions, that'll just leave a power vacuum and someone else just as bad will probably fill it. I wouldn't let that stop me if I were a (benevolent) dictator and had drones at my disposal, but with democratic national governments sensitive to political scandals, they probably avoid stuff like that unless they have some really good reason to do it (like lobbyists wanting them to).
They don't seem to have any problem finding what they're looking for, so why should they settle for a guy like me?
What makes you think they're finding what they're looking for? I think the high divorce stats in this country prove the exact opposite. They're picking the shiny and glamorous, and then changing their minds later on. Then they find themselves 35+, divorced (because they just couldn't stand the guy any more, or he dumped her for some reason), and bitter.
The last thing I want to do is finally land one and then disappoint her.
No offense, but I think you need to work on your self-confidence. This is coming from someone who has his own issues with that, so you're not alone.
and I would be suspicious of their sincerity anyway.
That's very wise. Leaving the country isn't that easy (unless you go to a 3rd-world cesspit), but if you have valuable tech skills it can be done pretty easily.
The Windows 8 UI proves you wrong.
You're far better off having kids and doing what First World Nations do, which is have women with kids not suffer in their careers.
We can't do that in the USA. That's like going to Zimbabwe and telling them, "just be more like Norway and everything will be better!"
If you haven't had a girlfriend by 31, I don't think the future looks too bright for you in the relationship department. Have you tried online dating?
Maybe you should think about leaving the country; you'd probably do better in a different culture. American culture sucks in a lot of ways, especially at younger ages where women have horrible criteria for selecting male partners.
I was raised by a single mother who adopted me, and my perspective is that it's horribly selfish. Children need to grow up with multiple adults, so they can see adults in real relationships, and also so they have someone around when they're young, rather than being around abusive babysitters and their boyfriends, or being latchkey kids who are alone most of the time.
Don't be a single mother by choice. Think about the life your kid is going to have.
The only problem I have with this idea is: the number of housing units in the country has not decreased, instead it's constantly increasing. The population is increasing too, but not at an astronomical rate. So it's not like housing is getting hard to find, however the costs are obviously rising greatly.
So why is this? Is the housing all being bought up by someone so the prices are inflated?
If $country has a declining population, then just open up the immigration flood gates and let the populations equalize. Or do you only want to be surrounded with people who look/act/think like you?
Actually, yes. Is there something wrong with wanting to only be around people I like, and not around people who irritate me with customs and values I don't share and don't really appreciate?
If you disagree, why don't you go live in rural Alabama for a while and get to know the locals there? Or some other part of the Bible Belt where most of the people are fundamentalists? Or better yet, someplace in rural Idaho that's dominated by white supremacists? What, are you now saying you don't want to be surrounded with just any random people, and that you actually prefer some cultures to others? How racist!
Famine in most parts of the world are a political problem, not a resource problem. There isn't much that can be done about political problems; you can either let them play out on their own, or you can send the Army in to intervene and set up a new government. In the former case, you get criticized for allowing atrocities to happen. In the latter case, you get criticized for stealing that area's natural resources and setting up a puppet government. Either way, the outcome is always bad.
They aren't, they're just pastimes for pretentious rich people or people who want to appear rich.
What are you talking about? It's not at all uncommon for married couples to have two cars which are wildly different from each other. Haven't you seen couples where the wife drives some nice, new(er), fancy car, and the husband drives some old POS beater to work? Or where one drives a small econo or sporty car, and the other drives a van or SUV? Why wouldn't it be normal for (while EVs still have limited range and recharging on trips is a PITA) couples to have one nice EV for driving around town, and one possibly somewhat older gas car for the occasional long trip and for one of the partners to drive?
Or, they could have 2 EVs, and a third gas car reserved solely for longer trips. It's not that uncommon for families to have a third car. I knew a bunch of middle-class families while growing up who had three, one rarely used. Or, people could just rent a car. How often do you drive that far away anyway? A few times a year? Enterprise will even bring your rental car to you.
Unless everyone is stupid. Which is admittedly an option when it comes to essential US infrastructure.
It's not just an possibility, it's a certainty if American Slashdotters are any indication. If our "tech nerds" are this backwards-thinking, I think it's safe to assume that the average American is dumber than a box of rocks when it comes to planning for the future.
You don't think people who can afford $75-100k for a car normally have two or more cars anyway? Single under-30 guys aren't Tesla's target market; the people who buy cars like this are older and married. Married people who can afford $100k cars do not make-do with a single car.
It's amazing how out-of-touch you Slashdotters are.
That's irrelevant. The issue is how much power you get with the available feeds. 220V has different feeds available than 110V, and much, much larger ones. With 110V, you're limited to 15A for most circuits, and 20A for some (like the one going to the washing machine). I don't think there's a such thing as a 30A 110V circuit in residential wiring. However, there's 30A and 50A (IIRC) feeds available with 220V. HVAC systems usually have large feeds like that available to them.
So with, for instance, a 30A feed, not only are you getting double the voltage, you're getting double the current of a normal 110V circuit, so that's 4 times the power.
You're forgetting that it's butt-ugly and has the quality and features of a 10K econocar. Also, isn't it lease-only?
Huh? Converting an automatic car to a manual transmission is almost never a good idea. You're much better off just selling it and buying another (used) model that has the stick-shift from the factory. There's way too many differences between them, especially with modern cars which likely have different engine computers. Even in older cars without the software factor it's a giant PITA.
The newest Prius doesn't look bad at all. However, it's made by Toyota, which has been shown to be incompetent at developing safety-critical firmware.
The SmartCars are butt-ugly, however. And it too little cargo space. The Prius at least seats 4 and has a nice hatchback layout with tons of cargo space.
My $8k used Volvo is incredibly safe, comfortable, and enjoyable to drive, and didn't cost much more than you spend per year on your ridiculous car's maintenance.
1) iPads (and tablets in general) will dominate over PCs once they solve the printing and windows compatibility problem (reality: even the latest tablets suck for these tasks, but PCs are in decline while tablets sales are set to overtake overall PC sales).
Tablets are outselling PCs because people already have PCs, and they aren't replacing them every 2-3 years like they did 10-15 years ago. PCs aren't getting noticeably faster, and software isn't getting horribly slower the way it used to, so everyone's just keeping what they have. This doesn't mean PCs are "dying". Go look at cars driving by you on the road; you'll see lots of people driving cars 10+ years old, since cars last a long time now. Are cars "dying"?
but many folks would gladly give up one or all three of those current benefits for a car that can be bought without going to a dealer, accelerates like a bat out of hell and is smooth and silent and gets OTA software updates and support. Tesla intended to disrupt the market and looks like they're doing so very well.
This is exactly correct. Plus, in the transition period, with so many households being dual-vehicle, it's quite likely many/most EV buyers would also own a gas car, probably less used. They'd use the EV for daily stuff, and the gas car for long trips. You don't really need to be able to drive cross-country in an EV.
Exactly. Or, just use your second car. Seriously, how many people who shell out $75-100k for a car only have a single vehicle?
220V is better for several reasons; not only is it capable of higher currents (with US residential feeds), it's more efficient than 110V since 1) the voltage is higher so you get lower line losses and 2) you're not splitting 220V across a neutral tap on a transformer, and creating an unbalanced load.
1) One needs to be able to charge it quickly, perhaps with an upper limit of about 10 minutes or so,
You don't really need this. When you have an electric car, you plug it in at home and recharge it overnight. Or at work, or some other convenient charging station when you're around town, once these become more ubiquitous. I don't know about you, but I only commute about 30 miles per day. I seriously doubt many people commute more than 100 per day.
If you can afford a $65k-100k car, you very likely have a second car as well. If the second car is a gas car, as it likely is, you don't need extremely long range or fast charging times. Use the gas car for the occasional road trip, and use the Tesla (or other EV) for your daily errands and commutes.
But you're right, once those three points are hit, gas cars are done for. But even before that, there's a market, I think, for people who might want an EV as one of their cars, to use for commuting. If Tesla or someone else made a small, inexpensive (relatively) EV with 100 or 120-mile range, there might be a lot of buyers interested in getting that as their commuter car.
Re-Engineering the electric infrastructure around an alternative source of energy which we do not have.
We don't have electricity? What are you smoking?
This isn't like trying to build hydrogen fueling infrastructure, which Pres. Bush was all excited about in the early 2000s. You just plug into the local power grid.
I'm really ashamed to be part of the Slashdot community. You so-called "nerds" are a pathetic bunch of luddites; you're just like buggy engineers who poo-pooed the then-new automobiles.
No one said the Model S would be available for 35K in 5-7 years. The plan is to make a smaller, cheaper, lower-range model for 35K.
The 35K EVs out there today are an embarrasment.
You're an idiot. The Tesla is rated at over 400 horsepower. There's no 30k Ford with that kind of power.