dlisboa · HackerLangs

26 日前議論

It's not "prohibitively" expensive if they managed to pay for flights to the US, hotels and then buy several pieces of hardware. They definitely had more than enough money to buy whatever they wanted in Brazil. It is, however, much more expensive than it should be, which leaves a bad taste in our mouths and means people will find other ways of acquiring some items.

dlisboa

2 か月前議論

> Bought something online and didn't receive your product? With PIX you're SOL, with Visa/Mastercard you get a chargeback.

Visa/Mastercard aren't handling chargebacks, the banks are. With PIX the way to get a chargeback is the same: if you've been victim of fraud you open a claim with the bank, they'll review it, then possibly give you a charge back within a week. This review process might take longer or be denied, which requires a lawsuit.

But it's only less risky for banks to chargeback immediately on Visa/Mastercard because they make so much money from credit card fees that they can afford it.

dlisboa

2 か月前議論

A "Pay with PIX" button is just a QR code. You reach the payment page, the merchant website generates a QR code, you open up your bank app, scan the QR code, confirm the merchant and the purchase, the merchant website runs a spinner for like 10 seconds while it confirms it in the background, and then you get a confirmation of your purchase with an order number.

dlisboa

2 か月前議論

External battery banks are a better reducer of e-waste as they'll work for all devices and not just the one cell phone.

dlisboa

3 か月前議論

That's not cynical. Trump has done the world a great benefit by transparently saying out loud what was hidden US policy for decades.

dlisboa

3 か月前議論

In the matter of drone production, which was my point, it doesn’t change the calculus. It is evident that short of regime change or popular upheaval Iran can produce or import drones indefinitely and the only thing that can stop it is a ground invasion.

The US Navy or any navy can’t destroy that production from the air.

The evidence is pretty clear on that. We see that is already the case in Ukraine or with Hezbollah and Ansar Allah.

dlisboa

3 か月前議論

Some of them. These were the stated objectives as per general Tommy Franks:

* Depose's Saddam government

Accomplished.

* Identify, isolate, and eliminate Iraqi WMDs

Failed. They were never there.

* Find, capture, and drive out terrorists from Iraq

Failed. Iraqi-based terrorism increased in the aftermath.

* Collect intelligence related to terrorist networks, and to "the global network" of WMDs

Failed. North Korea tested its first nuclear weapon in 2006, years after the invasion. The US accuses Iran of trying for them to this day. Chemical weapons were used by ISIS.

* End sanctions

Accomplished.

* Deliver humanitarian support to the Iraqi people, including the displaced

Failed. There were more displaced people due to the war than before and a higher need for humanitarian support which took years to complete.

* Secure Iraq's oil fields and resources, "which belong to the Iraqi people"

Accomplished. Somewhat, US and UK based companies, plus China, now runs a lot of their oil fields. Iraqi GDP per capita is one of the lowest in the region.

* Help the Iraqi people "create conditions for a transition to a representative self-government"

Arguable. Parts of the country want to secede and have armed groups. Representation and turnout is not amazing, but I guess not even in Western countries it is.

dlisboa

3 か月前議論

That'll never happen.

dlisboa

3 か月前議論

> A US CSG could simply sit in the Hormuz strait shoot down any incoming missiles and keep it open.

They can't even do that in their own bases. Most of US defenses have been severely overestimated due to propaganda. They hadn't been tested and when they were they've shown themselves lacking.

dlisboa

3 か月前議論

> A blanket comparison of Russia's attempts to eliminate Ukraine's industry with US Navy's ability to eliminate Iran's is ... questionable. We've flown 1000s of uncontested sorties over Ukraine, and Russia has been relegated to knocking down apartment buildings with Iran's own drones.

Russia has literally taken over the industrial heart of Ukraine in the east and southeast regions. With boots on the ground, tanks, everything. They claim it as their land. And yet they can't stop Ukraine from building drones.

That's far more than the US/Israel have done or are willing to do. It's extremely realistic that they do not have the capacity to destroy Iran's drone making capabilities, ever.

dlisboa

4 か月前議論

Production is not a hard problem. Iran, a heavily sanctioned country, already has drone production in other countries. That's assuming no other country would want to sell them their own drones to boost their domestic industry, like Turkiye has been doing for Ukraine.

Most of the Iranian drones are quite sophisticated for what they need to do. On a pinch they could replace many of the non-critical components for cheaper parts. They don't need composite materials if they were simply trying to outproduce. Meaning their production facilities could be much simpler than they are currently and still sustain enough output to matter.

dlisboa

4 か月前議論

You're making the same argument I am. If Iran had a small increase in accuracy they could hit targets that'd disable a lot of Israel military and civilian infrastructure. A lot of stuff is getting through. To counter that Israel has to achieve a perfect interception record. The balance is throughly on the side of offensive drone/missile warfare.

dlisboa

4 か月前議論

> that could be 100 billion USD in deferred revenue, if we assume that LNG is not going anywhere from wherever it's sitting underground, and will be simply extracted and sold later

That's not how revenue works at all.

dlisboa

4 か月前議論

A trillion seems large but it's not that absurd. The drone that shut down 17% of Qatar's LNG capacity is said to have caused 20 billion USD worth of annual lost revenue. They said it'll take up to 5 years to rebuild so that could be 100 billion USD in lost revenue, plus whatever it costs to do the rebuild.

A trillion dollars worth of damage seems possible if spread over some years for some countries in the Gulf where shutting down a desalination plant would cause depopulation.

dlisboa

4 か月前議論

Israel is similiarly lucky that it is surrounded by neighbors with US bases that can intercept missiles and drones before they get to it. All of its more competent enemies are very far away. In a different scenario there'd be no motivation for a country like Iraq or Jordan to help.

They can afford to try to destroy Iran's offensive capabilities because in-between countries allow their airspace to be used.

Wars are usually between neighbors. If a neighbor has a huge stockpile of drones they can launch a first salvo that'll overwhelm whatever defensive capabilities the other country has before they even get to the point of destroying launchers/manufacturing.

Threats of massive drones strikes are the closest deterrent a country can get to nuclear weapons without developing nuclear weapons. If Iran had 5 million drones instead of 50 thousand this war wouldn't even be happening.

dlisboa

4 か月前議論

Very few countries lack the technological capabilities to produce these kinds of drones.

What most countries don't have is, for lack of a better term, the resolve Iran has shown. Venezuela could have built drones and resisted just the same, but it's internally divided enough that it was possible to strike a deal with an inside faction and have a coup from within.

dlisboa

4 か月前議論

There is an assumption here that the value in improving defenses is the same as improving offensive weapons. That is not the case in the assymetry that drones provide and Russia is the first example.

Russia has not been able to improve AA capabilities to the point where it's "safe", for any definition of the word, neither has Israel. Israel and Gulf states often tout over 90% interception rate yet it's really at the mercy of Iran to not target their most vulnerable sites. If Iran was routinely targeting desalination plants and refineries it wouldn't matter if it was 99%: one hit is all it takes. Similarly Russia cannot keep Ukraine from targeting their oil infrastructure.

Air defenses need to be 100% to prevent physical, economic and moral damage. That is an impossibility.

dlisboa

4 か月前議論

Humans today perhaps. People tend to underestimate our abilities in nature because we’ve evolved to be able to shape it. In reality humans had generationally transmitted oral knowledge of food, plus are the only animals that can transform food at will, including from “toxic” to consumable.

dlisboa

4 か月前議論

It was $999 back then. They could be made cheaper today. Those were Intel chips.

dlisboa

4 か月前議論

A solution to a problem that doesn't change the current state of affairs, which by your definition makes it a simple solution, is not an actual solution.

There are plenty of simple solutions to real problems whose only blocker is upsetting the status quo. "We have no housing...let's build more housing" is, in fact, a very simple solution. That it doesn't happen has nothing to do with it the solution itself.

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