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jsbg

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That was a scene in The Office. The salesmen phone the cheaper competitor's customer service while on a sales call to let them see how long they would wait on hold if they needed support.

That said, I had an experience recently where the chatbot replaced the phone tree that led to a human and it was very helpful.

Yeah, because he was guarding them against the current administration abusing the Justice Department to go after them. Same reason he pardoned Fauci and others.

Are pre-emptive pardons a common thing for American presidents to do?

MAID in Canada 11 months ago

according to chatgpt, 25% of people die of cancer in canada; presumably dying of cancer is a lot worse than MAID so one might expect this number to grow beyond 5% unless there are just that many people that object to it for themselves on philosophical grounds

the theory of comparative advantage

It's not a theory. Firms trade internationally because it's cheaper, not because they "believe" in free markets.

But government (society) can take a longer term view than a company that is influenced by pricing signals

Private markets routinely make multi-decade bets; entire industries (mining, energy, infrastructure, biotech) work on 20–100 year horizons. Risk and time are already priced in.

Free market works in theory because you assume complete information

Free markets don’t "assume" anything; they function through decentralized price signals. And even with imperfect information, dispersed actors still aggregate and react to knowledge far better than any central planner can.

I'm not really into celebrities

I don't understand how that factors in. It said my score was 34/40 but really it was 34/35. The rest I didn't know and I selected that I didn't know them.

The long-term systemic effects of these drugs are still largely unknown.

The long term effects of obesity are very well known though and unlikely to be better than any still unknown negative effect semaglutide might have.

In the US you have to be worried about taking an ambulance or visiting the ER may cost you thousands for nothing.

No you don't. For one, if you are insured that is not a possibility. And 100% of the people I know who are not insured save more money than insurance would cost them given their incomes are higher and taxes lower than Germany. They choose to accept the risk because they are relatively young and healthy. All of them could cut down on luxuries and pay for insurance if they wanted to.

I once took an ambulance to the wrong ER, not understanding that I had to go to one that took my insurance. When the hospital found out my insurance wasn't going to pay, they lowered the bill by 90% and it was completely manageable.

Meanwhile in Canada I have family members that have to wait nerve-racking months for life-saving procedures or even imaging. In the US, I've had a few MRIs the same week the nurse practitioner ordered them for things that were absolutely not urgent.

in the best case you'll invent a new drink but I doubt it'll be very good; start with a very small amount instead of using the same proportions as with chartreuse and you may get somewhere interesting, like a gin sazerac kind of drink

my favorite cocktail these days is the bijou, which you can think of as a negroni with green chartreuse instead of campari, and with orange bitters—you wouldn't think chartreuse and italian vermouth would make a good drink but it's fantastic

bonus if garnished with a green olive