throwaway-x123 (u/throwaway-x123)

throwaway-x123 commented on Half a million South Korean workers walk off jobs in general strike truthout.org/articles/hal... · Posted by u/xojoc

refurb · 4 years ago

Are you arguing driving someone to suicide is then justified in the struggle for labor rights?

I’m trying to understand the point you are making?

throwaway-x123 · 4 years ago

I'm trying to explain where the anger comes from. Why do you blame the workers and not the conditions where this anger developed?

throwaway-x123 commented on Half a million South Korean workers walk off jobs in general strike truthout.org/articles/hal... · Posted by u/xojoc

treme · 4 years ago

The Korean Confederation of Trade Unions are known for their thuggish ways.

They frequently resort to violence, harassment and coerce all those that stand in their agenda.

within last year, they harassed a manager of delivery logistics company to commit suicide (specified and detailed harassment he faced on his will), cut off fuel valve of a delivery truck for not participating in their strike, and beat up a strike breaker.

The young worker demographic aren't keen to their ways, as exemplified by recent strike & protest of starbucks workers refusing help from KCTU when they volunteered to 'unite' in protest efforts.

https://news.v.daum.net/v/20210923195947254

https://www.edunctn.com/mobile/article.html?no=16927

https://www.chosun.com/national/labor/2021/09/17/ORHL7BDIABD...

https://m.khan.co.kr/national/national-general/article/20211...

throwaway-x123 · 4 years ago

Imagine anger when you live in poverty, you work 9 hours/day (minimum, from workweek in Korea) manual labor, some people at work die or get disabilities in work accidents. As a worker you know that everyone lives from surplus you produce, the food, etc, programmers do not make food. You can only do programming since they made food for you. So as a worker, you know you do something useful, right? So you deiced to talk with your boss, you told him all this and ask for better working conditions, little less working time, etc. He fires you. On the next job, you try to not make the same mistake, you organize collectively and strike. But this time, government use force to stop the strike and kills someone of your friends. Not surprising that some workers will be very angry.

throwaway-x123 commented on Ask HN: How do I get fit and healthy as a software engineer? · Posted by u/throwaway091721

throwaway-x123 · 4 years ago

May be will not help you prepare for marathons, but I saw a job posting with 2 hours or so of manual work in the morning or/and a few hours before sleep. They even advertise the job as exercise. Pros: 1. doing something useful and paid 2. manual work 3. + to your social status, since you will be worker-programmer

throwaway-x123 commented on Life Improvements Since the 1990s gwern.net/Improvements... · Posted by u/janhenr

nradov · 4 years ago

There's nothing stopping you from having more free time. Move to a low cost area, get a part time job, and live a frugal lifestyle. However most people have different priorities, and prefer to chase social status and material comfort at the expense of free time.

throwaway-x123 · 4 years ago

Why frugal lifestyle? Was it frugal lifestyle in 1970? From 1970 productivity increased a few times, so the work day can be reduced a few times.

I've spent some time looking for a part time job, there is none/rare. Also part time wage likely will not be enough for life support.

Almost no one have a choice in how many hours to work so we do not know what people prefer.

throwaway-x123 commented on Life Improvements Since the 1990s gwern.net/Improvements... · Posted by u/janhenr

JackPoach · 4 years ago

Should we be measuring at all? Claiming that people have to be more happy over time is a weird proposition for a biologist like me. Not only happiness does not exist (see reification), the idea that it can be 'measured and improved' is silly. Should the next generation of birds be more happy and fulfilled than the previous one? Should the next generation of chimps have stronger lasting relationships? Does it even makes sense? To me it doesn't. We are biological creatures and each one of us chooses to construct meaning of life (or lack thereof) individually.

throwaway-x123 · 4 years ago

As I understand, happiness is free time from necessary work. Quote from book Hunnicutt, Free time:

Benjamin Franklin, agreeing that “the happiness of individuals is evidently the ultimate end of political society,” offered his vision of Higher Progress: If every man and woman would work for four hours each day on some- thing useful, that labor would produce sufficient to procure all the necessaries and comforts of life, want and misery would be banished out of the world, and the rest of the twenty-four hours might be leisure and happiness.

Also Epicur: "Epicurus believed that the greatest good was to seek modest, sustainable pleasure in the form of a state of ataraxia (tranquility and freedom from fear) and aponia (the absence of bodily pain) through knowledge of the workings of the world and limiting desires. "

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epicureanism

throwaway-x123 commented on Life Improvements Since the 1990s gwern.net/Improvements... · Posted by u/janhenr

throwaway-x123 · 4 years ago

Life improvement is more free time. Free time is time free from necessary work. This includes free time from cooking, cleaning, etc, life support activities at home, too. In total, the number of working hours on average is higher than in 1990, I think, for full time workers. For some workers the work day increased to 12 hours/day, from 8 hours. It is unlikely the worker will be able to use his free time after long work day so even with non-work productivity improvements, he may not see the improvement. It might be that just 1 hour of additional free time is a better life improvement than anything. Universal cable, he list as a life improvement, is hardly worth longer work day.

I want to say that IMO: the workday should be lowered. It is possible to produce all necessary things for living in just 2-4 hours/day, including houses, cars and many more. See productivity growth. Free time can be work too, but it should not be seen as necessary work, everyone should be able to make a choice: work necessary time (2-4 hours/day) or longer. If you think something worth your free time, OK, work at your free time. But what happen is that you try to tell me that I have to work each day 8-12 hours/day so you can have an universal cable or a new video game, etc. Not cool.

throwaway-x123 commented on Finland provides housing and counseling to the homeless (2020) scoop.me/housing-first-fi... · Posted by u/mpweiher

lmilcin · 4 years ago

I always wonder what is the point of progress if we can't use it to solve basic problems like people not having food, shelter or access to basic medical help.

throwaway-x123 · 4 years ago

Lets consider more common case with working poor. At the same time we see high income inequality. We see unemployment. We see that productivity is a few times higher than it was in 1930. What is the solution? I think you know it, it was done once, 100 years ago. The work day was reduced to 8 hours/day. It could be reduced now to say 4 hours/day. No wage cut. In the past, who reduced the work day? The workers organized and reduced the work day. Why they do not do that? I think they do not know that they can work less. They still think they need to work more to produce all the food, more houses, etc. While in reality they produce income inequality, lots of bullshit jobs and unemployment.

You can help, agitate, organize, join union for shorter workday same wage.

throwaway-x123 commented on Sci-Hub Twitter account suspended twitter.com/Sci_Hub... · Posted by u/submeta

Beldin · 4 years ago

Not to take away from Sci-Hub, but even without institutional access, there are often alternatives:

- more and more research institutes have a public repository of articles.

- plenty of authors put their own (preprints of) papers on their personal website, a preprint server like arxiv, or researchgate.

- lastly, you can mail an author and request a preprint. Not all will reply, but plenty will be happy that someone noticed their work and send a copy.

throwaway-x123 · 4 years ago

I do not know, I use scholar.google.com and most of the publications not accessible for free. It is impossible to ignore a publication if you do not have access to it, it is highly demotivating, like doing something that is already done.

Asking by email.. too many publications at the moment.

throwaway-x123 commented on Sci-Hub Twitter account suspended twitter.com/Sci_Hub... · Posted by u/submeta

submeta · 4 years ago

I am no scientist, and I have no access to paywalled platforms and publications. So Sci-Hub is my only available option, and it is increadibly valuable when it comes to doing research on a specific topic. - I can remember the old days of the internet, pre-wikipedia, when encyclopedias were a paid thing. And I did not have the means to subscribe to them. And I remember the days of the internet pre sci-hub, where a layman had no access to publications. Those were sad days. We should not go back to those days. Everyone should support efforts that are towards the vision of shared knowledge, accessible by anyone. Especially in a world where misinformation is spreading like a virus.

throwaway-x123 · 4 years ago

Support how?