So, die of skin cancer instead of Alzheimer's?

Nope, there's now a vaccine for that.

When Ukraine dissects the remains of Russian drones or missiles, they inevitably find western components. In one case, reported on here, they found an Nvidia chip inside a missile.

Is someone, or someones, inside the supply chain redirecting chips? Is this the same as the servers getting to China? Or is this merely a case of someone buying this stuff under a shell company and then passing it along?

I had to add minimum paragraph and sentence counts to the prompts it uses to keep it from trying to write a few terse sentences each time.

I noticed this in Claude (from DDG). It invariably tries to shorten sentences or make them more compact and concise. Sometimes that can be good, but most times long-winded sentences are what are needed.

and there is no way I can find to make it stop popping up giant intrusive ads for their other services every single time I open it.

Just like Firefox. There is no easy way to turn off being harassed by an intrusive pop-up telling me about a new update.

There used to be. It was a simple checkbox. But somewhere along the way someone had to justify their existence and removed that simple checkbox in favor of harassment.

Would like to add one tidbit because I've had this same conversation at work. The professor stated they used AI to help edit only after hundred of hours of writing. In other words, they did the heavy lifting and only used AI at the end to help refine what they had already done.

Is this any different than a human editor? If I write a book, do what I can to edit it down, then go to an editor who makes suggests, removes or reorders parts, and so on, is that any different than having AI do the same thing? In both cases you wrote the words. In both cases you went somewhere else to help edit.

If people claim that using AI to edit a work is "cheating" because it's no longer your work, then the same should apply to a human editor.

Ragebait isn't about seeing what the other side says.

It's about seeing an inflammatory caricature of the other side.

For example, a Liberal isn't going to see some Conservative discussing some of the hard tradeoffs we'll need to pay down the debt. They'll see a Conservative proposing that Trump be given a 3rd term and trans kids get rounded up and forced into conversion therapy or some crap like that.

Meanwhile, Conservatives won't see some Liberal discussing the economics of Universal Healthcare. They'll see someone proposing that the police be defunded and all drugs are legalized.

Ragebait creates echo chambers because it gives the false impression that everyone on the other side is insane.

It's a fun conspiracy theory, but this is actually just how biology works.

There's basically four kinds of things that can go wrong with our bodies. Infections, mechanical issues, system errors, and cancer.

Infections we can cure by helping the body to kill off the infection, it's only some rare stubborn ones like AIDS that are chronic like you describe.

Mechanical issues we can fix with surgery.

System errors? That's stuff like genetic disorders where our body creates too much of hormone A or doesn't create the proper form of protein B. The problem is in our DNA and you can't cure it without rewriting our DNA (which we're getting to).

And then there's cancers, which are similar to infections, where we try to kill it (as they're doing here), though weirdly, some research suggests treating it as a chronic issue might be better for the patients.

In either case, it's not the fact that pharma is deciding "don't make a pill to cure it, just find a lifetime treatment!". It's only in the past few years that we're reaching the point where we can actually cure things that were traditionally chronic.

"Can we get it in cornflower blue?"

Don't mock it. Cornflower blue can be valuable.

Musk's data center near Memphis, KY has been illegally using pollution-producing methane-gas generators since day one even though he said they would be temporary. He does not have a permit for these generators and conveniently, the site is located near a poorer section of Memphis.

Needless to say, the EPA has not done anything about this even with its own decision of illegality.

No need to switch to generators when you can use them from day one and not have to worry about doing anything under the current regime.

Instead of rare books, let us rare video games or computers. Let's say someone bought a rare version of a Ninentendo system (an early edition) and said, "You know what, I'm going to see what happens if I apply a larger and larger force to it. Let's see how long it stays intact."

Mind you, they did a 3-D scan of the system so you can digitally see it, but the physical copy no longer exists.

How many of you would raise a stink at destroying it?

If not Nintendo, pick something you like and go back to its earlier days where something is rare and someone wants to destroy it, just because.

One of the things people complain about the digital age is loss of information. Sure, these books "exist" in a digital form today, but what about in 50 years?

This is why physical books are still superior to digital. We can still read books/scrolls/clay tablets from centuries ago. It is doubtful the same will be said for digital books.

And Threads now appears to have roughly 66% more monthly active users than X.

I've heard almost nothing about Threads recently. Certainly no indication they were more popular than Twitter.

Is their user count some sort of trick with how they interface with Instagram? Or is Twitter just turning into a ghost town without people realizing it?

This is one of the reason why Western governments do invest in foreign aid.

It's not just charity (though that's certainly an element), but the more stable and prosperous developing nations are the less likely they're going to have to deal with a refugee crisis.

Taking antiviral tablets for 8 to 12 weeks can cure more than 95% of cases.

As any anti-vaxxer like Robert F. Kennedy, Jr will tell you, if it's not 100% effective then it's useless. This drop in Hepatitis C cases can in no way be attributed to an antiviral medication. In reality, it's just people's natural immune system becoming more effective.

Note: if you have to ask, yes it is.

IPVM said that Flock subsequently blocked it from purchasing its cameras for testing.

That sounds so familiar. Just stop them from purchasing and you won't have to worry about them testing and finding flaws in your cameras.

which are?

Nothing in particular. Just the inability to move, muscle pain or stiffness, joint pain, and swollen, painful, or tender lymph glands in the armpit to name just a few. And that's just for dosage given under supervision of a doctor. If someone decides to use the horse version, they can have seizures or go blind. This is in addition to other neurologal or gastrointestinal issues. Or death.

So now that you have been factually informed, go ahead and make excuses and/or move the goalposts.