A study published in April zeroed in on antibiotics specifically and found similar results. Researchers used a model to estimate contamination across the world’s rivers based on the annual human consumption of the 40 most-used antibiotics, including ceftriaxone, cefixime and amoxicillin (anyone who has had a bacterial infection has probably heard of this one). They found that 8,500 tons of antibiotics leach into the world’s river system, with the potential of reaching the ocean. This number doesn’t include contamination from manufacturers or the agricultural industry.

Bold part is interesting considering that animal agriculture uses about 70% of all antibiotics produced (80% in the USA) and probably a similar fraction of vaccines. But I suppose that no one really wants to hear about that.

Agreed. There is no need for even more microplastic in everything from deep-sea sediment to rain clouds. But I suspect that as people accumulate more and more microplastic in their brains, they will become less and less capable of making rational and ecologically-responsible decisions. A vicious cycle.

Some do! Or at least, they give you a choice of OS at different price points. NovaCustom, Eurocom, and AVA Direct come to mind. Of course, there are also plenty of vendors that ONLY offer GNU/Linux pre-installed…

Ah, of course. If you depend on the government and human-made infrastructure, New Zealand and Finland and the like are definitely more reliable than any countries at the equator. (Except Singapore? Interesting.) Governments don’t grow durian though.

Severe weather events in New Zealand

I know that New Zealand has the ocean to buffer it against temperature extremes, but based on this image:

it seems that the island of New Guinea, which is also east of the Wallace Line, has experienced similarly mild warming in recent decades. Maprik (3.63°S, 143.05°E) at ~200m, for example:

seems to have a much more durian-friendly climate than even areas at sea level on the north island of New Zealand (e.g. Ahipara).

And that’s not even Borneo. What is the advantage of New Zealand? Am I missing something?

GitHub

Windows

privacy

Pick two and call me back.

Best way to protect yourself is to find some land at a comfortable elevation near the equator and start planting fruit trees.

Not even fair to compare to 2024. This year is on track to be the warmest non-El Niño year on record.

My immediate concern is what a sufficiently large asteroid might do to the durian trees. Mangosteen survived Krakatoa by becoming a lesbian, but I wouldn’t gamble with durian. Can’t some aliens just sterilise the humans instead? (Non-violently, of course.)

a berry pie without any sugar but what’s already in the berries shouldn’t be too bad.

Wolves have been observed to subsist on almost exclusively blueberries during the height of the season in Yellowstone, so I’d say the glyphosate residue in the flour is much more of a risk than whatever fruit is in the middle.

THIS is the actual definition of Veganism, directly from the people who coined the term:

That definition is from 1988, so it’s questionable whether it came “directly from the people who coined the term” in 1944. Here is a re-publication of the 1951 Leslie Cross definition:

“The object of the Society shall be to end the exploitation of animals by man” and “The word veganism shall mean the doctrine that man should live without exploiting animals.”

Allegedly someone read The World Peace Diet (by Will Tuttle) to Donald Watson on his deathbed, and Donald Watson said that the book encompassed everything that he intended when he founded the Vegan Society. Make of that what you will.

Probably ‘Silk’, AKA Latundan, from the Philippines.

Did you ever find an answer to this re: reforestation projects? Could be useful to relocate termites in order to introduce the microbes to grasslands.

Someone has to be the first.

Water is good for washing. A radical idea. So radical, it just might work.

UPDATE: https://techcrunch.com/2025/03/03/mozilla-rewrites-firefoxs-terms-of-use-after-user-backlash/