Why, it generated so called 'economic growth'. It's clearly a pyramid scheme waiting to collapse, just you wait.

Yeah, and the whole 'technical revolution' pyramid scheme lasted only for 250 years.

Yes, I have. Groceries and fuel have been largely flat over the last years. That old canard: "but REAL inflation is UP! UP! UP!" is simply bonkers. Alternative inflation measures like Billion Prices Project agree with the official inflation numbers.

First, central bankers have shown a remarkable restraint. There haven't been ANY hyperinflation episodes in developed countries for more than 50 years. Even in developing countries or xUSSR countries most hyperinflation episodes are linked with political upheavals.

In fact, right now ECB doesn't print _enough_ money - inflation is way under the targeted level, threatening to go into outright deflation.

Nope. That 'insufficient grazing' theory is bullshit. Animals are known to ruin nascent ecologies. In practice, desertification is caused simply by insufficient water.

Actually, government needs to start spending _more_ and taxing (rich people) even more. That _will_ help the economy right now. As it is, government has been contracting for 6 years now.

Incorrect. A crooked bank teller would be put into prison and bank would have to compensate you. In the case of a crooked bank president the _government_ (or state-run bank insurance organization like FDIC) would have to compensate you.

The classic banking system evolved for a LONG time to minimize the effects of bank failures and bad bank employees. Besides, it's almost impossible to actually _steal_ money from a bank. Sure, you can rob a bank and maybe get a couple hundred thousands in cash. But stealing any non-trivial sum is impossible, because accounts are not kept in anonymous cash.

Correction: for Polywell it's 13 registered neutrons. I've been following them and it _looks_ like scaling laws seem to work for Polywell, but it's also becoming more and more complex to build them.

Yes, they should be forced. The same argument applies. Of course, a black photographer at a KKK rally might reasonably ask for security guarantees.

Answer is: "Yes, they should be compelled". If they don't want to be compelled, they're always free to switch to a different carrier.

I do like living in apartments. Sharing walls is a non-issue in proper houses with actual sound insulation (also doubles as heat insulation).

Just make a machine that does "Ping!" and be done with it.

I used to work in a lab with nitric acid and azides and those nice sniffer dogs and complicated explosive-detection machines (that puff air at you) never detected anything. Even though I probably had more materials indistinguishable from explosives on my clothes than an average terrorist.

Then once I tried replacing an auxiliary laptop battery with clay. Nothing from those X-Ray scanners as well.

And Boston? And Chicago? And the whole eastern coast? Most people in the US live in 'cities' (densely populated areas) with population larger than 100k.

My house in Ukraine is served by multiple competing ISPs. My ISP offers 100Mbit (can be upgraded to 1Gb) for about $15 a month with a public IP and a TV service. Optional phone service is also offered, but nobody bothers (everyone has a cellphone these days).

How do they survive? Switching one ISP to another is a hassle. It has a non-zero cost - you need to be at home when the workers come to install wires, for example. And your new TV service might lack a channel that you like.

Oldsters here remember 90-s with multiple competing dial-up ISPs - switching them was literally as easy as it gets, yet almost every city had multiple ISPs.

Most of the heat goes into melting the polar caps and into the ocean. It doesn't persist in the atmosphere.