@ChrisMayLA6 I once supported a project to give training to women market stall holders in a town in Zambia. The idea was that training in business skills would help them prosper more. At first the women agreed to this, but after some thought they came back and said they wanted to learn English "because nobody listens to you if you don't speak English". (A bit later roughly a quarter of the funds were spent getting them out of jail after they went on strike to protest at increased stall rents.)
@ChrisMayLA6 coming late to this discussion, but yes, English is a major factor in our economic survival, and no it’s not because of Britain . It’s because of America.
If the US had ended up speaking Spanish or German, that would be a the lingua franca by now.
And yes, English is an easy language to speak very badly and still be understood. Other languages have a higher bar to comprehension. There is actually a convincing theory that what is now spoken is actually pidgin Welsh with few rules.
I see #ElonMusk is saying that if X (formally Twitter) goes to the wall, it will be the 'advertisers [that] bankrupted the company'... once again he seems unable to see that is a symptom not the cause of X's problems; which of course lies with him.
I guess we'll be seeing another flow of folk into the #fediverse if the advertisers 'strike' continues (s many think it will).
Its an extraordinary example of billionaire hubris!
For supporters of a #hydrogen#transport economy, its all looking a bit like the Betamax/VHS choice in the 1980s (for this of you old enough to recall the river video system);
@ChrisMayLA6 doesn’t mention that at current less than 4% of hydrogen is Green, the rest from fossil fuels. And for green hydrogen to be economically viable, you need a lot of cheap electricity, which benefits BEV more.
The hydrogen ladder as mentioned, we do need to invest in Green hydrogen for when we do need it, but road transport and home heating isn’t it:
@ChrisMayLA6 As the article says, it takes 3x more energy to power a H2 car than BEV. Until we have an excess of renewable generation, it isn't green.
The H2 powered BMW iX has less range, but cost more than the battery iX. Or Mirai costs the same, is the same weight and size and has a similar range to the Tesla Model S, but has less luggage space.
And instead of being able to fill up at home, or at convenient charging points, there's only a few H2 pumps in the country. H2 for cars is dead.
when a Bank of England director tells you its 'possible' interest rates will be reduced over the summer....
Of course its possible they'll be reduced, but my guess is they'll just want to keep them high a little longer... just to make sure those pesky workers & their demands for a return to pst standards of living have been firmly dampened down.
Perhaps, by some strange co-incidence they'll fall the month before an Autumn election?
Looks like the #AntiMonarchist demonstrators were subject to a classic bait & switch operation today - they were reassured through detailed meetings with the #Police, led to believe there was a way that they could exercise their right to protest, only then to be arrested when they did... so much for #democracy - another step down a road we're constantly told is merely scaremongering.... its almost entrapment
@ChrisMayLA6 There’s goes any future engagement between police and protestors at least as long as the current laws are in place and the current #ToryCriminalsUnfitToGovern are in power. Any new parliament will have to rescind these laws that criminalise people for a difference of opinion; and do a great deal to build trust in any police force in future. MetPol also arrested safety volunteers in Westminster last night for having rape alarms. Held from 2am and all day. #abuseofpower
As #Trump wins (by a large margin) the Republican caucus in #Iowa, the prospect of a second Trump term edges closer....
What seemed unthinkable not so many months ago, now starts to look possible.
Whatever, #Americans might think (rightly or wrongly) about #Biden's record in Govt., the notion that Trump might be an 'improvement' to someone on the other side of the Atlantic looks delusional...
I'm just perplexed about how he gains any support at all, but clearly he's appealing to something?
@ChrisMayLA6 even the Italians, for all their reputation of corruption, convicted Berlusconi.
The US however is too far gone, and has probably entered its final death spiral as a unified democracy.
Of course the media will want to paint all this as politics as usual, either because they are inept, or because their owners want to create a picture of normalcy because that's good for business.
On a low turnout (37.2%), Labour secured a 20% swing in tis favour to win the #Rutherglen#byelection beating the SNP by 58% to 27% of the vote... while the #Tories crashed to 3.9%.
And, now the reading of the runes can get under way....
@ChrisMayLA6 I assume CCHQ are now in full panic mode. The conference didn't go down that well outside of the hall, and the PMs great reset is unravelling with fact checking and closer scrutiny . With this result, any thoughts of the SNP keeping Labour numbers down are probably also out the window.
CVs set to update!
@fkamiah17@ChrisMayLA6 The SNP have only themselves to blame, but By-electins often throw up results like that on low turnouts.
The UK media will no doubt paint it as the death of Scottish independence, but I don’t think we should read too much into it. I’m hoping that, at Holyrood or UK General Elections, voters will realise that Labour offer the same as the Tories.
I sometimes thought my father thought he could't die while he still had books on his pending pile (a stab at immortality I seem to be replicating)... so, it was strangely touching to see Tom Gauld has had similar thoughts.
If you were hoping that somehow #renewableenergy would exclude #nuclear power (most obviously due to its financial costs & the historic problem of its waste products)... the fact that the rising price of #uranium would suggest demand (by Governments' #energy programmes) is rising will be disappointing news.
Whether its a victory for sectoral lobbying or a lack of confidence in developments around energy storage from renewables, its not good news for anyone wanting the end of nuclear power.
I guess it is a victory for people hoping that every solution for our CO₂ problem will continue to be used. Especially those that have already been shown to work.
As for the »obvious« objections and disappointment, I submit that if you look at the actual facts and put them into perspective, then the disappointment will be much lower.
I'd say the »nuclear waste« problem is another scare story, because:
It is not much at all. The total amount of spent nuclear fuel ever generated by humans fits a cube of 35 m sides. Or »tens of thousands of metric tons« if you want to scare people. This is much less than the amount of coal replaced by the contents of a single spent fuel cask.
It is dangerous, but not exceptionally so.
Deep underground final repositories, such as in Finland, are known to work.
At the risk of reigniting a debate that has been had in my timeline in the past... here's a report of a University of Valencia that looked at over 20 paper examine the differential effects of reading digitally & on paper.
The research confirms my experience (my own & in the reading of my erstwhile students) that reading digitally is less likely to lead to long-term educational (knowledge) benefits...
Hmmm.... so #KeirStarmer's 'plan' for the #NHScrisis is to start off by 'encouraging' staff to work overtime to help start to clear the backlog, while they wait for investment to kick-in.
He claims the staff are 'up for this because they know that bringing down the waiting list will reduce the pressure on them in the long run'.... OK... but presumably only for the short time before his long(er) term plan comes not focus...
Getting already burnt out staff to work (even) harder is a big risk!
@ChrisMayLA6 I worked in A/E (or ED if that's your bag), and trust me, no one, and I really mean No One will be volunteering for any time over and above the 12 hour shifts that they already work. (UK, other countries may be different)
The pressure, the grind, the abuse - (but also the feeling of accomplishment when things did go right for nice but very frightened people) turned every shift into a physical and emotional roller-coast ride.
Or maybe I have just got too used to retirement :)
@JelliedHeals@ChrisMayLA6 There's plenty of evidence that people engaged in high cognitive workload tasks make increasing numbers of mistakes if they work over 8 hours a day or 40 hours a week. We put strict limits on how many hours airline pilots or train drivers can work to avoid lethal outcomes—why not medical professionals too?
(That was a rhetorical question: you know why and I know why, but the folks with the money refuse to recognize they need to pay for 50% more medical professionals.)
Having just seen another casual allusion to 'this overcrowded isle', I think people who believe the UK to be over-crowded either don't understand the shape of population distribution or think the whole country looks like the suburbs of #London.
There may be an issue about the carrying capacity of this island, but on a purely spatial level its not overcrowded, the population is just clustered in a few places.
A less clustered population might also help re-balance regional #inequality?
@danjac@ChrisMayLA6 or perhaps work locally, and forget about the centralised work ideal, that seems to drive both businesses and economic thinking. Whilst economies of scale are recognised, the costs of organising big locations is often ignored. The York centre for reviews looked at the evidence that big hospital complexes were more efficient and safer, and found that the optimum size was about 3-400 beds. Yet we insist on building bigger & bigger hospitals whilst reducing the number of beds.
Hurrah... good sense breaks out in the #NorthWest as the 'Waitrose of the North', Booths begins to get rid of self-service check-outs.
Given the price premium at Booths, we (the customers) want the social interaction with staff at the checkouts, not be told to 'scan & bag'!
More importantly, not only do checkouts provide regular local employment, they are also for many semi-isolated shoppers a key bit of rare social interaction... so a welcome reverse!
@RolloTreadway@cvwillegen@dweebish@ChrisMayLA6@Greenseer@actuallyautistic
I have found a really great solution: I'm in a Co-op. That's a little community store that orders bulk for you and has basic items and produce right there. I pay a little monthly fee and get to shop in this friendly DIY environment. I can chat, I can hang out, or I can just collect my stuff and leave. I feel totally relaxed there. No annoying ads, lights, sounds or music. Just the things everyone needs in a tiny store, and my boxes on a shelf with my name on it, if I ordered bulk. And the atmo is so incredibly nice, that I often start a convo just for the fun of it.
A small but significant global movement is seeking to make #publictransport free to use as a central plank to #green urbanism.
as the Guardian point out:
'Flourishing & accessible public transport systems are an essential feature of sustainable 21st-century living. They are a means of social inclusion & wellbeing, helping to generate a sense of place and collective belonging'!
Being free from fares can be a big part of this... but in the UK we're wedded to an altogether different model!
@Jennifer@ChrisMayLA6@Henrysbridge@bookstodon Yeah he's a really great Amos, and I'd have to re-read and re-watch to put a finger on what I mean by "drift" I think, but it doesn't ruin him at all.