Platystemon posted:

On the Third of January, Earth is farthest from the Sun, its orbital motion is lowest, and thus the Sun moves through the sky the slowest. Based on the motion of the Sun, January 3 is twenty‐nine seconds longer than the mean.

luxury handset posted:

nyc is great if you're rich

not so much if you're normal

we have to break out of the mid 20th century paradigm of coastal cities being beacons of bohemian culture and update to the 21st century paradigms of them being segregated playgrounds for the wealthy

adoration for none posted:

There's a little nuance to that, in the sense that nationalism isn't inherent to human nature. Modern nation states appeared only a few hundred years ago. The "mechanism" you describe of people naturally categorizing in-groups and out-groups is true though.

In a sense, modern nation states are sort of a refutation of this as well. Every European country is a hodge-podge of different languages and cultures, and nationalism managed to absorb some of these smaller "nationalities" into larger ones, some more successfully than others.

Ironically many modern ideologies basically boil down to "actually you belong to a different in-group", for good or bad. My personal im14andthisisdeep take. I think I just said "I agree" in so many words.

PittTheElder posted:

Yup. And vastly more accurate than a pistol. Longer barrel means you can shoot a more stable bullet faster and straighter. This is in addition to it being easier to aim and put optics and such on.

Hence why armies don't deploy their line infantry with pistols.

luxury handset posted:

pretty much all small arms are rifled. the big difference between a pistol and a rifle in terms of accuracy is that the shorter barrel = less accuracy, and also a weapon with a stock you can brace against your shoulder is easier to aim. even things like having a trigger that's hard or heavy to pull can make a pistol less accurate, because as you squeeze the trigger the gun rotates a bit in your hands if you're not holding it right

really the biggest advantage of pistols is that they are relatively small and pocket sized, so it's a better gun to carry around if you need to be carrying a gun around all day for whatever reason but aren't really expecting to use it that often. sort of like the multitool of firearms as opposed to lugging around a full sized tool box

MeinPanzer posted:

The Greeks have had a rough go of things, but they are pretty crafty when it comes to tax evasion. See also the permanently-empty “family restaurants”/“cafes” that exist in basically every tiny village. In practice they’re just an extended family room with a kitchen attached that exist for tax breaks. They’ll serve you a frappe and have some sad tyropitas or cookies available for sale but they’re always surprised when any non-resident of the village rolls in.

Grand Fromage posted:

Believing Koreans are a separate species isn't that uncommon in my experience living there. I had to go to a different doctor once when I was told he'd only studied Korean biology so couldn't help me.

steinrokkan posted:

It would still make infinitely more sense to have a conventional structure of interconnected lines for your metro / rail to minimize the longest potential distance you have to travel to get from one place to another. A straight line is never going to be an efficient way to organize anything on a two dimensional plane.

Carbon dioxide posted:

A Buttery Pastry posted:

Now I'm wondering, did anyone manage to make a terrible planned pre-car city? Or is the problem with planned cities less to do with not growing organically, and more to do with literally not being designed for humans?

A Buttery Pastry posted:

Looking at wikipedia, it seems less an issue of population and more of density. Like, the population density of the metro region is apparently a little below the entire country of the Netherlands?

Albino Squirrel posted:

It's longstanding tradition to move your capital to a planned city once you feel the original one is inconvenient for whatever reason.

And sometimes it works out! Ottawa, Canberra, and D.C. are all perfectly reasonable cities and less crowded than the metropolises they replaced. Never been to St. Petersburg but from what I've seen it looks somewhat nicer than Moscow.

FreudianSlippers posted:

By 2025 Brits will be resorting to cannibalism and either fighting for or being raided by one of several warring neo-barbarian factions.

evilbastard posted:

Australian summer time it is slightly weirder, where we have an additional timezone Australia/Eucla that is GMT+8:45. This makes this region with around 200 permanent residents one of only two quarter-hour timezones (the other being Nepal with GMT +5:45).
We have Norfolk Island at GMT+12 which does have Summer Time, although the countries near it do not.
Also, Broken Hill in New South Wales actually follows ACDT South Australian time because Adelaide is closer to them, and they just want to be annoying.

Edgar Allen Ho posted:

The only universally popular US map is the one that still has Rhodesia and two Germanys at your kids' school.