derek

I think you'd find more agreement stopping at "I'd rather use a free alternative". I agree with your sentiment. Repacing proprietary tools built by rent-seekers with volunteer/community run projects whose developers hold user freedom and choice in high regard is categorically better for most people.

Corporate requirements, vendor lock-in, and the friction of momentum make that tough for some people though. I'd still ask they give the alternatives a shot, of course, but I can understand why some might still choose the ideologically inferior option.

For those people? Having options like the open source circumvention tools mentioned allows them to continue using what they've paid for (and ought to ostensibly own) without being forced to pay extortion money to do so.

I think you got voted down due to your out-of-hand dismissal of that well engineered alternative with an uninformed value judgement.

tl;dr: you're correct on the first half but too hasty on the second half.

You've got some excellent replies to this question already. I want to add something a therapist told me about therapy that I've found helpful.

Therapy isn't about fixing everything that's "wrong". It's mostly about identifying coping mechanisms we developed during childhood which no longer work for us as adults. Different techniques are used to help clients start opening up to doing therapeutic work or starting it in earnest. The goal though, regardless of the technique, is for the client to know themselves better and use that knowledge to build better emotional and social tools. To replace the coping mechanisms we've outgrown with better ones.

A comparison I've made is that therapy is like working with an occupational therapist. What's "best" is conditional and is often usefully defined by what we find difficult or limiting. The best way to pick up something we've dropped varies person to person. The important bit is having healthy ways of picking it up again (with or without direct assistance).

Therapy ought to focus on self-understanding which helps us function in reality. In my experience most modern therapists advocate for this even if they aren't forward about it.

Any therapist who councils you to capitulate to narcissists or ignore your disability should be reported to the relevant licensing authority for negligence at a minimum.

I've found it's the movement and change of context that helps me. Taking a walk, going for a ride, or even just moving to a different room helps my brain kick out of one of these ruts. Dancing is a high energy option that I'm not always ready for but, when I am, it's very cathartic. 🙂

ADHD is a spectrum (as is all neurodiversity) but one of the neurochemical commonalities between people who meet the diagnostic criteria for ADHD is disregulation of norepinephrine. Getting on meds that work and engaging a therapist who can help develop better emotional tooling and coping mechanisms can be life changing. One of my coping mechanisms is changing the scenery. Norepinephrine is a precursor for a whole bunch of essential chemistry so engaging other systems that need it seems to help other areas.

Everyone is different but I've found that if my brain is stuck then my body is usually stuck as well. Unstick the body and, after a while, the brain wants to follow.

When nothing sounds satisfying and I have no gumption whatsoever I can introduce something locally novel in an attempt to kick things into gear again. Executive dysfunction can make choosing from options tough (or temporarily impossible) but, on not-the-worst days, I can at least stand up and start walking aimlessly until I start to feel different. Walking outside tends to help the most.

It's nothing strenuous or fitness focused. Just a leisurely stroll around the bedroom, yard, neighborhood, etc. After a bit I usually feel like doing something. Even if that's just more walking at least it beats mean mugging the wall until I want to cry or sleep. Usually I end up doing something I wanted to do earlier in the week though.

Disclaimers: This isn't medical advice. Don't hurt yourself.

It's only bad for you if you burn yourself. There was a study a couple of years ago showing a strong correlation between application of heat on insect bites and a reduction in percieved itchiness.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10309056/

My pet theory is that two things are happening.

1. The mechanisms for sensing itch and heat from our skin overlap and can interfere with each other.
2. Transferring heat quickly enough breaks down the chemical or cocktail causing the itchiness. My best guess is that the heat denatures them ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denaturation_(biochemistry) ) or the sudden shift provides a shock that's disruptive enough to get the job done. Like moving something from hot, to cold, to hot again when sanitizing.

The linked study suggests my first conjecture is, at least, a reasonable explanation for the immediate relief we feel.

Itch and pain, distinct sensations with specific receptors and mediators involved, interact with each other. A painful stimulus, such as noxious heat, causes the inhibition of itch signalling.

There are a few recent studies floating about which address aspects of mosquito bite itchiness pathophysiology. We still don't know exactly why that happens though. Without that info I can't draw the same conclusion for my second conjecture.

Anecdotally I've found success treating mosquito bites by

1. Heating water while putting something cool on the bite
2. Once the water is near boiling: taking the water off the heat and letting it cool to ~60° C / 140° F
3. Soaking a bit of metal in the hot water until the metal heats up
4. Touching that hot metal to the bite for a few seconds.

A fork or knife works fine. Anything that will radiate the heat away from itself and into the skin quickly. Ice or cold water works for the cooling bit. I've also used an ice cold metal can a few times.

If the metal is too hot it can cause a burn. antiscald.com has a nice chart for this: https://antiscald.com/index.php?route=information%2Finformation&information_id=15

If we reference that table alongside the Denaturation wiki article's chart we can identify the line we're towing. We want something hot enough to kill the itchiness but not so hot it'll damage our skin. 55° C applied to the mosquito bite for five seconds or so seems to do the trick. Your mileage may vary.

I agree that city-owned grocery stores won't solve the food affordability problem on their own. I do take issue with this statement though:

Grocery stores aren't particularly profitable in the scheme of things.

That's bullshit. 🙂

Kroger posted ~$150,039,000,000 in revenue, ~$33,364,000,000 in gross profit, and ~$2,164,000,000 net profit for 2025. They posted a gross profit margin of ~22% and a net profit margin of ~2%.

That's pretty profitable. Profitable enough for the CEO to walk away with ~$15,400,000 of it. That's not as profitable as economic abortions like FAANG but I'd argue nothing should be.t

Even if it weren't: we don't have to make farming cheaper or control the entire supply chain. The issue is primarily top-down. Not bottom-up.

If, after we enforce the paying of livable wages, a crop is too labor-intensive to be economically sustainable then we ought to either subsidize that expense because we collectively agree that's the best option OR stop mass-producing the inefficient food.

Capping C-level salaries to a reasonable percentage of the company's lowest paid worker and capping profit per-item based on total cost to create, process, house, and distribute each item to retailers would be much more effective means of lowering the cost of groceries nationally.

Corporate logistics, especially for perishables, already have all of this information and more. It's how they know how much they can gouge the consumer (or what price to set if colluding in price-fixing schemes).

City-owned grocery stores don't solve the whole problem. No single solution can. It's a good beginning for the effort though. Starting with the top-end of the stack, where most of the waste occurs purely due to corporate and individual greed, makes sense and sets the stage for addressing other systemic issues within that industry's supply chains.

The cookie variety concern also seems misplaced to me. Though you didn't list it as a blocker. Just a problem these kinds of solutions can't solve.

I agree. I don't see why a municipal grocer would need to match the variety offered by the private sector though. Their aim is to provide consistent access to safe and affordable staple food stuffs. Not help Nabisco weasel into additional market segments so numbers go up and make investors happy. The municipal grocer should only care about making their laborers and shoppers happy. We don't need cookies for that! Though I'd bet putting a handful of options from locally-owned bakers on the shelves would help.

You're correct.

Check out "The Separation of Church and Hate" by John Fugelsang. It's an almost comprehensive teardown of Christofascist ideology using the words of Jesus directly. No extras and no oulled punches. It's excellent. The author is a comedian and while the content is serious and presented well it's dressed up as an easier read than I expected.

I grew up Christian in the American South. I left religion in college and faith generally a few years later. I was initially compelled to leave organized Christianity exactly because it demanded exercising cruelties which Jesus clearly opposed.

Fugelsang's book gathers all of the major contradictions between Jesus and modern right-wing Christianity then dismantles any justification for each one just by quoting Jesus. I'm recommending this book to every reasonable person I know as required reading for the present moment. Not just in the US but the world over.

Fascism respects nothing and if it takes root in a land with the means to export then no shore is necessarily safe harbor.

An surprise, I'm sure, but a welcome one.

Eyes don't normally do that. I think you should ~~squirt~~ see a doctor.

Yes but, also, no.

You already seem familiar but, for the uninitiated playing along at home, Wikipedia's entry for Simulation Theory is a pretty easy read. Quoting their synopsis of Bostrom's conjecture:

1. either such simulations are not created because of technological limitations or self-destruction;
2. advanced civilizations choose not to create them;
3. if advanced civilizations do create them, the number of simulations would far exceed base reality and we would therefore almost certainly be living in one.

it's certainly an interesting thought. I agree it shouldn't inform our ethics or disposition toward our lived experiences. That doesn't mean there's zero value in trying to find out though. Even if the only positive yield is that we develop better testing methods which still come up empty: that's still progress worth having. If it nets some additional benefit then so much the better.

I'd argue that satisfying curiosity is, in itself, and worthy pursuit so long as no harm is done.

That all still sets aside the more interesting question though. If such simulations are possible then are they something we're comfortable creating? If not, and we find one has been built, what should we do? Turn it off? Leave it alone? "Save" those created inside of it?

These aren't vapid questions. They strike at the heart of many important unresolved quandries. Are the simulated minds somehow less real than unsimulated ones? Does that question's answer necessarily impact those mind's right to agency, dignity, or self-determination?

The closer we get to being able to play god on a whim the more pressing I find such questions. That's not because I wring my hands and labor anxiously at truth or certainty for lack of better idols. It's because, whatever this is, we're all in it together and our choices today have an outsized impact on the choices others will have tomorrow. Developing a clearer view of what this is, and what we're capable of doing in it, affords future minds better opportunity to arrive at reasonable conclusions and decide how to live well.

I'm not confident you're participating in good faith here but, on the off-chance you are; I'm not sure I take your point.

Can you substantiate your initial claim? "The floor on confidence in knowledge is now basically nothing" seems too broad a statement to meaningfully defend.

Even if we assume you're talking about US 8th graders you'll have to be more specific. The US has seen degraded academic performance across the board but the degree varies by State (and often again by County).

What's "necessary help" is up for debate as well. There's a hint of something I can agree with here though. I do agree that, for certain vocations, it's important for individuals to have firm graps on the fundamentals. Programmers ought to be able to code without IDEs and Mathematicians work problems without calculators. I don't agree that the common use of good tools by those professionals results in the brain-drain bogeyman you seem to be shadow boxing.

What am I meant to be alarmed about, exactly?

An exquisite typo.

For the curious:

https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/746684/why-does-a-microwaves-faraday-cage-block-microwaves-but-not-larger-wavelength-r

The metal screen on the microwave door is designed to block the specific wavelength being used to heat your food. It isn't a full cage and isn't effective at blocking other frequencies.