MentalEdge

Aaand that’s several more paragraphs on condescension.

So what I’m getting is this: your problem is that I didn’t write my comment in the form of a watertight essay, while discarding any mention of anything that is unlikely to occur in the immediate future?

Firstly, you are the one who started from the premise you need to own a car to commute, and indeed that one should own a car capable only of commuting and other very short often bikeable trips.

Did I? Imo I merely expressed that the weight problem of cars meant that how they are designed should change. How does “we should have” mean everyone should have one, and only use that?

All I meant is that smaller and lighter, shorter range cars should be available, and be considered as normal to use as what is normal now.

And why did you just write nine paragraphs at me explaining things I’m fully aware of?

Do you think people with ideas about how the world could work, are somehow blind to how it does work?

To clarify, I find your reply unhelpful, because you explain the logical course of action for an individual to make the most of the current sorry state of western transport. US transport, to be specific.

And in reply to something obviously rheotorical.

Your answer is not even close to the most efficient solution to transport we might come up with as a society.

Meanwhime I am commenting about that hopelly improved future, where owning a car in the first place is no longer a choice made for you.

Where you can head out, and get to any point on the map for a reasonable cost, in a timely manner, while owning nothing more than the clothes you’d be wearing.

I literally live in a country where that is how it works. It’s possible.

Yup.

There truly is no alternative to car-centric infrastructure. And there is no way to reduce the distances we all simply must drive. /s

You’re presenting all these factors as if they’re intrinsic and unavoidable. They are not. We should not only move towards smaller vehicles, but denser urban design that removes the need to regularly travel stupid distances.

Intercity travel is truly the WORST in a personal vehicle. Why the hell would I drive somewhere for hours, when I can sit in a train and game on my steamdeck the whole time?

I know the US sucks in this regard, but that’s a reason to fix things, not perpetuate the problem.

Let me ask an even more basic question, who said you need to own a car, at all?

Because that was the auto-industry, too. You know what we did for “generations” before we all drove small sedans for generations?

Walked.

And it worked fine. When cities were for people, not cars, nothing was ever so far apart that getting from A to B was inconceivable without a personal vehicle.

Who said you need to own the car you need for a couple days, once or twice a year?

Do you buy the moving truck each time you need to move your stuff to a new home? What about the bus, train, or plane you use to go long distance?

“don’t want to” is not an argument as history has shown consumers will buy whatever marketing convinces them to want.

That’s kinda the whole reason behind the current big car problem in the US. It’s not what consumers wanted, it’s what automakers made in order to skirt environmental restrictions.

Another reason to have smaller cars with smaller batteries with shorter ranges, just enough for the every-day commute.

Why do you need to bring several hundred kilograms of road-tripping range to work and the grocer every-day?

Why? dB is logarithmic so it’s difficult for people to picture how loud something is, if that’s the only number given.

Altman going “yeah we could make it get things right 100% of the time, but that would be boring” has such “my girlfriend goes to another school” energy it’s not even funny.

“What’s a computer?”

Yes. Because when I pause to discuss a show I’m watching with someone, or to otherwise pay attention to something else for a moment, for some other sound and video to play is exactly what I want.

This makes literally no sense. The whole point of pausing, is that it’s something you do right before you turn your attention away, and that’s when they want to show you ads?

Either these ads won’t work, because no-one will look at them, or they will defeat the point of pausing, annoying the living shit out of your users. It’s a lose-lose for everyone involved. Including the advertisers.