while_true_ (u/while_true_)

while_true_ commented on Trump Returns to Gasoline as Fuel of Choice for Cars nytimes.com/2025/12/03/cl... · Posted by u/thelastgallon

schmuckonwheels · 11 days ago

Unironically giving the people what they want. EVs are still well within the realm of enthusiasts and rich people.

The infrastructure isn't there yet, and most blue collar families cannot afford an EV, nor the home electrical modifications needed. One-car households cannot abide the inflexibility. Oh, and forget about renters, they were never part of the equation. The EV mandate was one of the biggest ivory tower initiatives ever enacted by the government and it was objectively a failure.

No one said EVs are bad. But they are one small part of a larger picture that includes ICE and hybrid for many years to come. Purists will be upset, but they will never be satisfied with any reasonable compromise.

while_true_ · 11 days ago

"Used electric vehicle (EV) prices are currently lower than those of internal combustion engine (ICE) cars, with used EVs averaging about 8.3% cheaper than used gas-powered cars." Late model used EVs can be good bargains.

while_true_ commented on EVs are depreciating faster than gas-powered cars restofworld.org/2025/ev-d... · Posted by u/belter

xp84 · 2 months ago

Sub-Headline from this article: "Plummeting resale values are threatening to derail the world’s transition to electric transportation."

Alternative take: "EVs now easy to afford for the 80% of Americans who don't have $50-90k to spend on an EV!"

This year I bought a 2022 EV with 16k miles. A luxury brand. The sticker price when new was $79,000. I paid $35k. It was an off-lease vehicle so if anyone took a bath, it was the bank. I would never in a million years spend 80 grand on a car but now I have a great EV.

Battery life is not a huge concern. Any more than timing belts/chains, transmissions, etc. can be dauntingly costly repairs for cars with 150k miles or more.

I also have a gas car which I love (spouse drives the electric for a much greater commute) so I'm no EV absolutist. But this whole premise is stupid. EV adoption has had 2 main blockers: 1. only rich people had justification to buy them until recently, and 2. Charging space for people who don't have their own private garage.

Now #1 is no longer a factor. This is a GOOD thing.

while_true_ · 2 months ago

FUD about battery life and having to spend over $10k to replace one was a large factor in EV depreciation. Some people assumed car battery life was like that of a cell phone or a laptop, perhaps 3 years. There is increasing evidence that EV batteries with good battery management systems will last 15+ years (see https://www.geotab.com/blog/ev-battery-health/). Once the general population understands an EV will outlast a gas car and needs less maintenance, resale value should improve.

while_true_ commented on Why is Linux still trash in 2025? · Posted by u/coolThingsFirst

while_true_ · 2 months ago

Interesting, I have the opposite opinion. I'm considering switching from Windows to the KDE Plasma desktop and so far I'm impressed with it. Plasma is the first Linux desktop I've used that feels polished and professional. It is more customizable than Windows is. I'm looking to avoid Win 11 with its telemetry, background downloads, advertisements, OneDrive problems, etc.

while_true_ commented on IQ tests results for AI trackingai.org/home... · Posted by u/stared

while_true_ · 4 months ago

On the MENSA IQ test GPT-Pro got 34 out 35 correct for an IQ of 148. Very good. Rumor has it the one question it missed had something to do with instances of "b" in "blueberry."

while_true_ commented on Car has more than 1.2M km on it – and it's still going strong cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-s... · Posted by u/Sgt_Apone

hdgvhicv · 4 months ago

If externalities were correctly priced in to fuel, rare earths, rubber, road wear etc then it would be easy to see, the cheaper the better.

But they aren’t, not even close. Oil is massively subisidised by the military before the environmental costs. Brake particulates and tyres don’t cover the cost of microplastics and lung damage, heavy cars don’t pay anywhere near the damage they cause to the roads and bridges etc.

Due to this you can argue pretty much whatever you want by ignoring certain costs depending what you want to come out with.

My petrol car is 20 years old, it’s done 70,000 miles, it weighs about 1,000kg and burns through 300 litres of unleaded each year to do the 3,000 miles I do in it.

I suspect scrapping and replacing this with even a small electric car would not be globally environmentally worthwhile. There may be improvements to local air quality assuming regenerative breaking etc, that may be offset by increased tyre and road wear though, even ignoring the impact of the co2 to generate the 80kWh a year it would require.

while_true_ · 4 months ago

20 year old cars tend to be heavy polluters because they don't meet the latest emissions standards. Here in California the state will buy old cars and scrap them to get dirty emitters out of service. Also, nearly every day electrical generation is over 50% using solar, wind or hydro so EVs are cleaner here than any ICE vehicle by far.

while_true_ commented on Car has more than 1.2M km on it – and it's still going strong cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-s... · Posted by u/Sgt_Apone

mrweasel · 4 months ago

There are some calculations that makes replacing a old gas or diesel powered car more environmentally friendly, as compered to buying a new electric car. I do wonder where the tipping point is though, and if there isn't an environmental argument to be made that not only should government bad the sale of new internal combustion engine cars, but they should also ban cars with an expected lifespan shorter than e.g. 15 - 20 years.

while_true_ · 4 months ago

That 1985 Toyota emits more GHG and NOx per mile than a new vehicle because it wasn't built to meet the latest US or Canadian emissions standards. Older vehicles emit more pollutants so in some US states the government will buy the car to have it scrapped, thus improving the overall fleet emissions statewide. In California there are owners who keep and maintain pre-1975 vehicles because they have little or no smog control systems, are easy to work on, and they are exempt from mandatory bi-annual smog testing.

while_true_ commented on Companies Tried to Save Money with AI Now Spending a Fortune to Fix Its Mistakes · Posted by u/laurex

while_true_ · 4 months ago

https://futurism.com/companies-fixing-ai-replacement-mistake...

while_true_ commented on Chinese citizen charged with flying drone over key US Military, NASA launch base nypost.com/2024/12/11/us-... · Posted by u/blackeyeblitzar

blackeyeblitzar · a year ago

I noticed this person is being charged with something that could lead to just 4 years in prison if convicted. That was surprising to me. Isn’t this almost certain espionage? Shouldn’t that carry a much harsher punishment?

while_true_ · a year ago

Investigation might not be complete, they could add an espionage charge later. Depending on what US code section they charge him with it could be up to 10 yrs, 30 yrs or life.

while_true_ commented on Black Hole Puzzle johncarlosbaez.wordpress.... · Posted by u/besmirch

jiggawatts · a year ago

Any such blog / article / video that features a Penrose diagram is just wrong, because it's using mathematics that doesn't apply to the physical universe.

Penrose diagrams draw black holes as if they have existed forever, and will last forever -- that's what the "future infinity" line means.

Obviously black holes form at some finite time, and Stephen Hawking showed that they evaporate in a finite time.

This matters. A lot!

Fundamentally, relativity does not allow observers to disagree on observations of what, only when. If an outside observer never observes someone falling into a black hole then they cannot fall in. It's just that simple! Again, for the slow people at the back of the class: Observers cannot disagree on this. If there is a paradox in your model, then your model is broken, end of story.

There is this weird aspect of modern physics of holding on to the almost-mystical "woo" aspects far more than is justified in either the mathematics or observations. Quantum Mechanics and cosmology are especially rife with popularisations of what amounts to science fiction story telling. It's fun to think about wormholes, white holes, alternate universe accessible trough black holes, etc... I've read these novels, they were fun! Not physical though, natch.

Much more realistically: An infalling observer is slowed down relative to the outside universe and the stellar remnant that formed the black hole. Effectively, the hapless infalling victim sees the black hole and the universe both "speed up".

The error most people make here is that they assume that the black hole is already fully formed in the infinite past and is "completed", making it a mathematically perfect sphere in a sense.

No!

It hasn't finished forming because as its gravitational field increases its time distortion increases. Its formation is "frozen in time" (actually just very very slow), it is never fully formed.

Infalling observers see this slowdown speeding back up, so what they observe is the light of the black hole evaporation getting blue-shifted and brighter until right before mathematically they would have "fallen past the event horizon" what they're actually seeing is akin to a supernova exploding in their face. They're blasted into subatomic particles, joining the radiation of the black hole evaporation many trillions of years into the future... but not infinitely into the future.

This model solves every paradox of black holes, making them boring and not sci-fi exciting again, which is why you haven't heard about it! Uncool stories don't get repeated on blogs for ad-clicks.

Just remember: there are no infinities in the universe, and anyone using one in their theory is almost certainly just making stuff up to sound cool.

PS: Penrose is also behind the kook notion that brains are quantum despite all evidence.

while_true_ · a year ago

It irks me so many physicists/cosmologists jump from the mathematical GR singularity at the center of a BH to "matter there has infinite density." That's highly unlikely, it's probably quark plasma.

while_true_ commented on Earth may have had a ring system 466 million years ago monash.edu/science/news-e... · Posted by u/geox

while_true_ · a year ago

At the rate we are going with quantities of satellites and orbiting space junk we just might get new rings due to the Kessler Syndrome

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