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#1
Computer Affairs / Re: Is it a good time to upgra...
Last post by Darth Wagtaros - Today at 07:42:32 PMI'm going to have to upgrade. My PC doesn't have a TPM and I'll need to upgrade ahead of Windows 10 ending support. I hate Windows 11 though.
I want a new GPU to play Baldur's Gate, but would need to buy a new mobo, processor, etc so I may as well just get a new one.
I want a new GPU to play Baldur's Gate, but would need to buy a new mobo, processor, etc so I may as well just get a new one.
#2
Off the Record / Re: Israel-Hamas War 2023
Last post by The Minsky Moment - Today at 05:14:40 PMQuote from: Razgovory on Today at 04:45:43 PMAre some nationalism's better than others? Lettow's southern nationalism seemed different than Swiss nationalism.
Some nationalisms definitely manifest in more ugly, violent and dysfunctional ways than others.
#3
Off the Record / Re: Brexit and the waning days...
Last post by Sheilbh - Today at 04:57:49 PMOne for Tamas - just been reading about proposal to re-open a 16km branch line from Bristol to Portishead. From what I can see this isn't NIMBYism - strong local council support and multiple local campaigns in favour of it.
Initial proposal with the local government launching a study of the project as a possibility (at a cost of £1 million) in the late 2000s. This leads to a Network Rail feasibility study in 2009. There was a public consultation in 2015 and, in 2019, central government allocated £31 million funding planning for the line to open in 2021.
The planning application and associated documents came out at almost 80,000 pages. 18,000 on the environmental statement (my instictive environmental take: rail travel = good), including over 1,000 pages of bat technical appendices (the plans now include a bat corridor - just like the various wildlife corridors with HS2), about 200 on newts and 1,800 on vegetation management. It then took three years, to 2024, for the Transport Secretary to approve.
The project is replacing old derelict (Beeching-era) tracks and building two stations. The initial £32 million has been spent on planning and design, so the cost will be £150 million plus - even so analysis of the benefit to cost ratio is at 4.85 (by comparison HS2 was 2.4 and Crossrail was 2.5).
Sadly the project's been paused by the Treasury following Labour's victory as the funding that initially covered it has been scrapped. Hopefully it can still get through - especially following the OBR report on investment.
But still
I get that a lot of the left/Guardian types will really hate things like Labour "weakening" environmental standards - but if that's the output and level of effort, time and money I feel like they have maybe got a little out of hand. Especially as, in my view, default view should be that unless we're literally building them out of endangered the species, the default position should be that the environmental benefit of railways and renewables infrastructure outweighs the impact
And if Labour don't - the Tories will - spotted both Badenoch and Jenrick endorsing very YIMBY/liberalising views recently
Initial proposal with the local government launching a study of the project as a possibility (at a cost of £1 million) in the late 2000s. This leads to a Network Rail feasibility study in 2009. There was a public consultation in 2015 and, in 2019, central government allocated £31 million funding planning for the line to open in 2021.
The planning application and associated documents came out at almost 80,000 pages. 18,000 on the environmental statement (my instictive environmental take: rail travel = good), including over 1,000 pages of bat technical appendices (the plans now include a bat corridor - just like the various wildlife corridors with HS2), about 200 on newts and 1,800 on vegetation management. It then took three years, to 2024, for the Transport Secretary to approve.
The project is replacing old derelict (Beeching-era) tracks and building two stations. The initial £32 million has been spent on planning and design, so the cost will be £150 million plus - even so analysis of the benefit to cost ratio is at 4.85 (by comparison HS2 was 2.4 and Crossrail was 2.5).
Sadly the project's been paused by the Treasury following Labour's victory as the funding that initially covered it has been scrapped. Hopefully it can still get through - especially following the OBR report on investment.
But still
I get that a lot of the left/Guardian types will really hate things like Labour "weakening" environmental standards - but if that's the output and level of effort, time and money I feel like they have maybe got a little out of hand. Especially as, in my view, default view should be that unless we're literally building them out of endangered the species, the default position should be that the environmental benefit of railways and renewables infrastructure outweighs the impact
And if Labour don't - the Tories will - spotted both Badenoch and Jenrick endorsing very YIMBY/liberalising views recently
#4
Off the Record / Re: Israel-Hamas War 2023
Last post by DGuller - Today at 04:45:50 PMQuote from: Tamas on Today at 02:27:00 PMI imagine this isn't something Israel could sit on indefinitely. It only takes one guy to drop the pager and see C4 fall out of it to raise the alarm. A zero-day hack, on the other hand, is something you can sit on for a long time, and I do wonder what hacks Russia and China have in their arsenals that they'll deploy if there is ever an active conflict with the West.Quote from: crazy canuck on Today at 02:16:39 PMI wonder whether the Israeli attack was actually a blunder. Wouldn't it have made sense to save it for when disrupting Hezbollah C&C mattered most?
I read in some article (summary) somewhere thst maybe the Israelis were worried their scheme would be discovered.
Then again maybe they had intel that hezbollah was preparing something big and wanted to prevent or delay it.
#5
Off the Record / Re: Israel-Hamas War 2023
Last post by Razgovory - Today at 04:45:43 PMAre some nationalism's better than others? Lettow's southern nationalism seemed different than Swiss nationalism.
#6
Off the Record / Re: Israel-Hamas War 2023
Last post by OttoVonBismarck - Today at 04:37:31 PMThere is no validity to Palestinian nationalism because ethno terrorism is intrinsically illegitimate. We of the West must always stand against it, especially when it is also associated with Islam—the eternal enemy of the West and the chief anti-Western ideology.
#7
Off the Record / Re: Israel-Hamas War 2023
Last post by The Minsky Moment - Today at 04:11:03 PMThe statement could have been made accurately in 1900. "Palestine" was a term up to that point mainly used by Europeans with a classical education. For almost all the Ottoman period, those lands were part of the Damascus province; they were "Syrian". Very late, the lands around Jerusalem were spun off into a separate province directly run from Istanbul, most likely for security reasons.
It's well known there was Jewish migration into the region in the late 19th century and increasing in the first half of the 20th. What is less known is that there were also significant levels of Arab migration from other areas during the mandatory period. So just as many Israelis descend from immigrants from elsewhere the same is true for some Palestinians as well.
What cemented Palestinian identity as Palestinian were two things: (1) Zionism, and (2) the utter failure of other Arab and Muslim powers to defeat Zionism. It's origin is as a reactive nationalism, but that is not an unusual origin, nor does it make it any less legitimate.
Zionism and Palestinian nationalisms are both nationalisms and their validity stands on equal terms with each other *as well as other nationalisms* Arguments to the contrary, whether made by pro-Zionists seeking to devalue Palestinian self-determination or by either Western leftists or antisemites seeking to devalue Zionism, all proceed from the same error that certain nationalisms are "natural" or "organic" and thereby superior to others. There is no such thing as a "natural" nationalism, and nationalisms do not exist in nature. They are all artifices.
It's well known there was Jewish migration into the region in the late 19th century and increasing in the first half of the 20th. What is less known is that there were also significant levels of Arab migration from other areas during the mandatory period. So just as many Israelis descend from immigrants from elsewhere the same is true for some Palestinians as well.
What cemented Palestinian identity as Palestinian were two things: (1) Zionism, and (2) the utter failure of other Arab and Muslim powers to defeat Zionism. It's origin is as a reactive nationalism, but that is not an unusual origin, nor does it make it any less legitimate.
Zionism and Palestinian nationalisms are both nationalisms and their validity stands on equal terms with each other *as well as other nationalisms* Arguments to the contrary, whether made by pro-Zionists seeking to devalue Palestinian self-determination or by either Western leftists or antisemites seeking to devalue Zionism, all proceed from the same error that certain nationalisms are "natural" or "organic" and thereby superior to others. There is no such thing as a "natural" nationalism, and nationalisms do not exist in nature. They are all artifices.
#8
Off the Record / Re: 4-day school week gains mo...
Last post by grumbler - Today at 03:32:16 PMQuote from: Darth Wagtaros on September 19, 2024, 07:30:16 PMIt went no where.
But is still gaining momentum!
#9
Off the Record / Re: Israel-Hamas War 2023
Last post by grumbler - Today at 02:45:31 PMThis argument that "Palestinian" has no "language, culture or history" basis is rich coming from a supporter of Israel, which is much farther from having a basis in any of those.
I could as easily describe "Israeli" as referring "exclusively to 'Arab-murdering Jews who desire lebensraum in Gaza and the West Bank.'" It would be absurd, but so is any definition of any group of people/state that ignores politics.
I could as easily describe "Israeli" as referring "exclusively to 'Arab-murdering Jews who desire lebensraum in Gaza and the West Bank.'" It would be absurd, but so is any definition of any group of people/state that ignores politics.
#10
Off the Record / Re: What are you listening to?
Last post by Tamas - Today at 02:30:52 PMQuote from: Savonarola on July 31, 2024, 05:11:45 PMBruce Springsteen - The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle (1973)
In most ways a step in the right direction from "Greeting from Asbury Park, NJ." The band is really starting to gel and developing the sound that would define Springsteen for some time to come. He's moved away from the folk inspiration from the previous album to a more old time Rock and Roll and R&B sound. The problem is that the compositions aren't quite there. There's no duds like "Mary Queen of Arkansas" or "Does this Bus Stop at 83 street?" but, other than "Rosalita", there's no gems either (unpolished though they were, the previous album had "Growin' Up," and "It's Hard to be a Saint in the City" as well as hits for Manfred Mann "Blinded by the Light" and "Spirits in the Night.")
Interestingly, his lyric role model moved from Bob Dylan, to Van Morrison; and he creates a romantic look back at suburban New Jersey the way Van Morrison did for Belfast.
I remember from his autobiography (well worth it in audio book format BTW) that the criticism thst hurt him the most about the first album was people thought he was trying too hard to be Dylan with the over-chiseled lyrics so he consciously moved away from that.