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>It doesn’t even seem to occur to people that one might pursue a doctoral degree because one is interested in the subject and wants to do research.

That's why I did a PhD, but of course, I'd still like some job security at the end of the pipeline. Currently a postdoc.


Also after Teslas keep catching on fire more than the damn Ford Pinto did.

Might not be enough data for good statistical significance yet, but IIRC the "die in a fire" probability in a Tesla Refrigerator is something like 17x the Ford Pinto based on current numbers.

Citation needed. Last I checked EVs are much less likely to catch fire than ICEs. (They are, however, much harder to put out if they do.)


That list is garbage: it includes Tesla Megapacks (energy storage, not car), multi-car crashes where any car catches fire, a car carrier carrying Teslas catching fire, etc.

Did you have any actual statistics to back up your assertion?


  Vehicle Model   | Total Units | Fire Fatalities |Fatality Rate (per 100k)
  Tesla Cybertruck|      34,438 |               5 |        14.52
  Ford Pinto      |   3,173,491 |              27 |         0.85
https://fuelarc.com/evs/its-official-the-cybertruck-is-more-...

Like the parent comment says, this is garbage. For the cybertruck it includes all fatalities (3 in a high speed crash that caught on fire, 1 in a different crash, 1 in the recent car bomb outside Trump's tower). For the pinto they only count the 27 deaths the NHTSA identified as being caused by the design flaw that led to catching fire from low speed collisions.

A meaningful comparison would say that the Pinto could catch fire as a result of a low speed collision and the cybertruck apparently does not.


tbh, despite the rap the Pinto gets it really was just as dangerous as the rest of the vehicles on the road [1].

Of course, a gas can with a spear pointed at it isn't a great design. But the rest of the cars were also dangerous as well.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Pinto#Retrospective_safet...


if you keep dismissing the data, maybe you can provide some data

The people involved are clearly trying hard to make the cybertruck look bad. If there was real data, I assume they'd present it. The fact they choose to produce these crude distortions instead implies to me there is not real data that makes the cybertruck look bad.

The data is right there. You're welcome to do your own analysis rather than ask other people to do it for you.

I'm not sure what your point is - as I've already mentioned this comparison is between all cybertruck deaths, none of which were low speed collisions resulting in a fire, and the deaths that the NHTSA review identified as caused by fires from low speed collisions caused by the design flaw in the Pinto.

I know that neither you nor the other commenters nor the person who made that website needs anyone to explain to you why this comparison is invalid. It is such a facile comparison that to describe it is to explain why it's invalid.

So, again, I'm confused as to the point of your comment.


My point is the data is right there and you can do your own analysis to make the comparison. Do you not know the difference between data and analysis?

I'm confused as to the level of your incompetence.



> the government was spending countless billions of dollars to push ideology

We can count the billions that the government spends on science, period, through the NSF, DOE, DARPA, and NIH. Thus, the fraction spent on pushing ideology is certainly not "countless billions".


> But explicitly discriminating to attempt to fix the problem is a bad way that makes people angry.

It's also illegal under the Civil Rights Act.


I think so too. It surprised me how people could do things like this and not be sued under the CRA.


Ok so maybe just stop letting the USA have that power. You think any realistic democracy can always elect good stewards of a world-spanning empire?


>They should take all the funds and time spent on this every year as part of every award, and just fund programs specifically designed to attract inner-city kids to science, or funnel talented, low-income, high school students to be mentored, taught advanced classes, etc.

Or just have pay for decent, functional K-12 schools in non-rich districts without housing bubbles?


> Homes are out of reach for most young people - which did not used to be the case.

That's been the case for most of my adult life, after the recovery from the Global Financial Crisis concentrated people into cities where it's against the law to build more housing.


>after the recovery from the Global Financial Crisis

Depending what exactly you mean, that's less than ten years. It wasn't until 2016 that median home sale prices exceeded 2008's.


I was thinking more 2010, for 15 years.


Prices in 2010 were certainly far more achievable than they are now. I was in college and had made a lot of career plans based on typical incomes an engineer could achieve and what a decent home cost in several cities at the time. It was feasible even on a single income for an engineer. Unless I hit senior staff+ at faang, a home is out of reach in several regions. It was never cheap but it was plausible.

Homes in Santa Clara weren’t always 2.5m.


>(and there's simply no place outside of academia to work on your own ideas).

And therein lies the rub. Excellent post overall!


Hmmm... and with video games as with academia, the glut of willing low-pay labor hasn't actually made the end product much better at all.


I've seen a lot of industry outfits fail to survive 18 months with everyone doing the job they were hired for.


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