spacemark

Right. It's not existential, sure. It helps that all our debt is issued in our currency. But the fact is that ~30% of our national debt is held by foreign entities, and at the very least interest payments are an outflow of wealth from our country. This is not a healthy position if we value freedom of action. It WILL eventually constrain our country in meaningful ways. At the very least the mechanisms to manage this debt will weaken our currency, leaving everyone that doesn't invest in the market behind (which is a sizeable portion of our citizenry).

Pointing out that earth is a closed system so it's all good doesn't address these very real concerns about our unchecked national debt.

Where do you get this idea that our national debt = private liquid assets? How does that make any sense at all?

This kind of intellectual rationalization about something that is obviously not healthy is why people distrust so called experts.

In your analogy, people are dying of thirst, but it's ok because the whole world isn't losing water. Mmmkay.

The cost of the war is zero? You're off your rocker.

The constitution grants Congress the sole power to declare war and authorize military force. The fact that our country's politicians have manipulated our system to the point that this has been disregarded basically since WWII should never be normalized.

This country has been run by the rich for a very long time and democracy is on its way out.

So what do you think the cost of the war is, then? $50bn? Seems like splitting hairs or missing the point. Even $50bn is too much for a war that congress nor the American people approved.

Surely at some point compounding interest will eclipse this, no? If our debt is 500 trillion does your opinion hold?

Lol. Speak for yourself, AI has not diminished my thinking in any material way and has indeed accelerated my ability to learn.

Anyone predicting the "end of humanity" is playing prophet and echoing the same nonsensical prophecies we heard with the invention of the printing press, radio, TV, internet, or a number of other step-change technologies.

There's a false premise built into the assertion that humanity can even end - it's not some static thing, it's constantly evolving and changing into something else.

Super cool. Hope to be well enough off one day to do stuff like this.

Sitting on a bike, you're even shorter than a pedestrian and more likely to be completely out of sight.

Not true at all except for the lowest-sitting cruisers. Most bikes put you eye level with an SUV driver and taller bikes above.

Don't be bothered by the down votes. HN consensus is not something worth pursuing. Your criticism is valid, it's just that it runs against what HN readers want to believe in this instance. Readers here like to think they're motivated by reason and intelligence and whatnot, but that is laughable - examples of logical fallacies and assertions of fact rocketing to the top comments abound. Overconfidence and readiness to accept bold claims is a more dangerous cultural dysfunction than the lack of seriousness and ubiquitous monetization that plagues other platforms.

In any case this study will likely go on the pile of papers judged by time to be an overreach of conclusions and a dead end.

Yeah, it's an obsessive personality trait that I've observed in most high achievers. Often not healthy. At least scrutinize your obsessions, people.

Seriously. Hasn't the main thesis of that book (a distinct advantage of human upright evolution is our ability to run long distances) and several key supporting points been mostly disproven scientifically (early humans often hunted by running to exhaustion, for example)?

Seems to me another enticing narrative with little to no sound evidence a la Guns, Germs, and Steel, Sapiens, and the like. The stuff this site loves to gobble up with comment after comment of supporting anecdata.

I definitely believe you. I know from a few injuries that with tendons you want to be moving and applying resistance as soon as you are able to prevent the formation of scar tissue and encourage blood flow. It's not a huge leap of logic that bones, too, benefit from movement and resistance when healing.

Honest question, how did you know to disregard the doctor 's instructions and start home exercises on the bone at 4 weeks? How did you limit yourself during your riding and other resistance work? How long was the recovery period after every session?

Maybe it's just too early or there are other posts, but I find it an interesting insight into human behavior - supposedly intelligent human behavior - that there were hundreds of comments on the posting of the original study here at HN, the vast majority of which accepted the study's conclusion, yet there are much fewer comments on the "adjustment" to the study's conclusion.

I shouldn't be too cynical, but it's a reminder to be skeptical, always.

I have no idea what you're talking about. Is Rumi a character in a video game or something?

Right, but life down there didn't independently spark from raw organic molecules. Or, rather, there is no evidence for that, whereas there is quite a bit of evidence to suggest all such life on earth is migratory to new ecosystems and shares one common ancestor.

That leap from organic molecules to "life" is still a bit of a mystery. And how often it occurs is still up for debate.

Look at Earth's history - trees existed for 60 million years before some chance bacterial mutation stumbled on efficiently breaking down lignin. And then boom, trees everywhere - every continent on earth - immediately (in geologic timescales) were decomposed.

The fact that it took 60 million years for extant bacteria to allow for that should give pause to any sweeping statements about the certainty of life and especially complex life.

Who or what exactly is this Creator you speak of? Would love to know.

It's not, this is all internet click bait sensational stuff. Wood can be an effective composite and has been used in space vehicles for at least 40 years. First time I saw it used was old LV fairings. These days there are much better composites available so the use of wood is likely for non-technical reasons.

Cool, appreciate the tip! I'll check them out.

Metal spatulas aren't an option for most, either, as they scratch pans. So what's the suggested realistic alternative? Wood?

Edit: wasn't trying to be snarky or anything. Honestly concerned for my family's health and trying to figure out the best path. Wood spatulas it is. Replacing all our PTFE pans with much more expensive cast iron pans isn't an option for our budget right now. Plus I haven't seen convincing scientific evidence that PTFE is as harmful as people here seem to imply. My understanding could be outdated though.

Humans are evolving right before our eyes, everywhere, always.

Still an interesting article, though!

Whoops, thanks for the correction. I was looking at end-user electricity consumption so it didn't include all the losses involved.

That's staggering at first glance. So much energy!

But then, I wonder how much it would really matter if we were harvesting that energy to move objects around on earth and turn on LEDs vs letting it dissipate into space. So I'm still skeptical of the concern.

Yeah the scale of thermal energy contained in the earth makes this fear (prematurely cooling the earth) irrelevant. The entire global consumption of energy is less than 2% of earth's thermal heat flow from the core.

Imagine working on something for over a decade only to see it fly just 7 times!

Haha, I'm guessing you don't work in the space industry. Frankly if something you work on gets to space at all you count yourself fortunate. My first job was at a defense contractor working on a big rocket. A senior engineer on our team had a picture of the Indiana Jones warehouse on the wall in his office, rows and rows of boxes. I asked him why, he said it's a reminder to not get too stressed about work - 9 out of 10 projects will never fly.

Things are changing especially in the new space corners of the industry, but for big projects requiring political will I think it's still the same.

No worries, glad we were able to come to a general agreement!

Hey, I don't view this as arguing at all. I'm sorry you do. I find it valuable as a check on my own thinking and assumptions. If you are feeling negative emotions with this exchange, please walk away!

if you refuse to accept very basic arithmetic facts in the simple example

I refuse to accept your assertions because they're simply incorrect. Basic power law math - a higher value exponent will always win, eventually.

Stock market option: $20k with no leverage -> 11% ROI on a $20k investment

P = P_o * e^(r*t)

P = 20,000 * e^(0.11*t)

Real estate option: $20k of your own money + $80k of the bank's money -> 4% ROI on $100k investment (counting both your money and the loan)

P = 100,000 * e^(0.04*t)

Set these two equations equal to each other and solve for t. This will give you the number of years the 4% return with a 100k initial investment will beat the 11% return with a 20k initial investment.

20,000 * e^(.04*t) = 100,000 * e^(0.11*t)

t = 23 years. After 40 years, the 11% return has beaten the 4% return by 3.3x

If I'm misinterpreting your "very simple and easily verifiable scenario," please let me know. But I don't think so. Your error is in this statement. I'll leave it to you to figure out why, let me know if you need help! ;P

(counting both your money and the loan) -> 20% ROI on $20k investment (counting only your own money) 20% is better than 11%,*

Let's ignore future cash flows and how those are invested, just consider the initial investment of $20k.

But that's only a tiny piece of the money you will spend on the house and ignoring this will obviously lead you to a false conclusion.

Anyway, you don't have to agree with the numbers. I can link you to articles where Warren Buffet also points out the same thing, but you don't have to believe him either. Or you can Google rent vs buy calculators and do the full picture math yourself, if you're really that interested.

An 11% return will always beat a 4% return eventually, no matter what the initial conditions are. The question is just when.

Valid-ish points. My calculation is my situation right now, and I don't claim it is going to be true for everyone across all time and eternity. But over the course of someone's working life, renting will net you far more money than buying in the vast majority of cases.

It's a basic power law situation. The only real question is WHEN the 11% return will overtake the 4% return. The interest on the 4%-returning loan is a factor, but it's secondary.

Sure.

It does depend on a lot, but the majority of scenarios you’ll put into rent vs buy calculators, for various places across the country, come out in favor of renting. In expensive areas, dramatically so. When interest rates are high, even moreso.

Let's take a quick look at my current situation as an example. Right now my family spends $2650/mth renting a nice home in the Denver metro area, with an excess of $2-3k/mth that goes into market investments at ~11% annual historical average. An equivalent house would cost us $600,000. Let's ignore the currently bleak housing market (where house prices have fallen ~10% in real dollars over the last 2.5 yrs), and assume your RE returns is a historical +4% annually (past 50 years).

Equation for compound interest at a fixed rate with initial sum: P = P_o * e^ (rt) After 30 years we would have the following equity in our home: P = 600000*e^(.04*30) = 1.99 million

This is with a total monthly mortgage payment of ~$4200 (including taxes and PMI), to have 1.99m at retirement.

Now let’s compare to renting and continuing to invest the money we would have spent on the house into market index funds. Equation for previous month’s interest added to $2k/mth (use excel): P_monthly =[previous month balance]*e^(r*t)+[monthly savings] After 30 years we would have the following equity in our investment account: P_monthly =[previous month balance]*e^(0.11/12*1)+2000 (use excel) = 5.73 million

So I'm paying almost the same (2650 rent + 2k/month), but have more than 3 MILLION DOLLARS MORE at retirement.

This is to say nothing of all the other costs of a mortgage besides loan interest (essentially the cost to get you to the point of buying a home). Throw out $12k in closing costs. Throw out the 10 yrs of opportunity costs putting our savings in a secure HYSA (4.5%) rather than index funds (11%) to afford a $100k down payment. Throw out maintenance ($5-8k annually) and all the time spent maintaining the home (thousands of hours).

You would be more than 3 MILLION DOLLARS wealthier if you continued to rent. The leverage helps you, but that 7% differential in average returns makes it inconsequential. The power of compound interest - it's literally the only way average people have any dream of becoming wealthy.

Homes are terrible investments, relatively speaking. It’s not even close.

Yes, in general, for the average person.

However, the flaw in this is that most people don't have the discipline to put excess cash they would have spent on a home into index funds and forego touching that money until retirement.

So a mortgage is a very compelling enforcement mechanism to get average people to save for retirement.

If we're being honest that's a much more powerful reason to buy a home than "leverage."

I'm saying even with leverage you would make far more money investing in index funds. The math is very clear. In the best real estate decades (which may be behind us), index funds may not win. But on average, over multiple decades it's not even close.