Twigs and branches

and isn’t time to talk about… about –
uuuuhh:

TEH INTERNET?
(If even the NYT writes – that it’s ALL the cyberspace’s fault – and a dead Greek Dude called ”Socrates” writes in comments:
”Facebook, Google, Amazon and other trillionaire corporations know best and need to organ harvest Americans’ privacy, personal data and every waking second of their lives in order to privatize the profits and socialize the losses as the US government remains in a 0.1% donation coma.
Of course we need to copy Europe with internet regulation and many other areas of common good.
330 million Americans have been flushed down a 0.1% corporate drain.
Time to regulate our way back to a decent civilization”.

Both neoliberalism and libertarianism overlap very heavily in a lot of economics (not Austrianism). And they both have had enormous amounts of money invested in their propaganda, literally billions of dollars. Kochs have led the way for libertarianism, but who has financed neoliberalism? Is it a different group? Do you have any suggested starting points for researching this?

I wonder if having something like AAA in the US for Electric Vehicles would help alleviate range anxiety.

stj posted late in the last twigs thread a comment that boiled down to “only Communists are leftists”, which I’d like to interrogate briefly despite the fact that anything but the most charitable reading reduced it to a No True Scotsman fallacy.

Anarchism is to revolution as libertarianism is to freedom. […] [Socialism] stands for the rule of the minority over the majority. This is not left.

Those two claims together are a rather tall order. Communism, being a strictly hierarchical ideology, is necessarily the rule of the minority (the Party leadership) over the majority (everyone they can put under their heel). Even if it stays true to principles and doesn’t degenerate into imperialist state capitalism (which historically it has tended to, and which stj handwaved with NTSm reasoning), it is fundamentally a hierarchical project that requires an authoritarian minority to rule over the majority. This is not left – and hence, one can quite fairly argue Communism is not left.

The fundamental problem, as stj admitted, is equivocation over what “is left” – and that is where the reduction of all true leftism to Communism begins to resemble the liberal rhetorical cudgel that is Horseshoe Theory. Politics are not one-dimensional, so reducing the possible space of politics to a simple 1D line is misleading even before one starts invoking multiple dimensions to place ideologies on that spectrum. Communism can be called leftist because it is anti-capitalist (in theory), but it should be denounced as not leftist because it is authoritarian. Liberalism can be called leftist for its (theoretical) anti-authoritarianism, but it should be denounced for its strong capitalist sympathies. Social democracy splits the difference with its forthright compatiblist approach – which I’d add is more honest than the unacknowledged compatiblism that Communism seems to inevitably devolve into once it goes from theory to practice. Anarchism (which was hilariously dismissed out-of-hand) of course strongly rejects both capitalism and authoritarianism, and is left according to either of these measures.

It’s rather bizarre to see anarchism be described as antithetical to revolution – and moreso to see it done with a comparison to propertarians’ co-opting of the anarchist label “libertarian”. Anarchism is fundamentally revolutionary, and always has been, to the point that I don’t even know where to begin to address the mind-bogglingly ahistorical claim that this is “preposterous”. The only way I can hope to parse that sentence coherently is to assume that stj is so mired in idiosyncratically American political discourse and so poorly educated in leftist history that they have mistaken anarcho-capitalism for almost all other anarchism. The historical record includes numerous examples of anarchist revolts – including those lovingly put down by Communists – but we can indulge in stj’s presentism and just look to current events in Syria. On one hand, we have the incomprehensible Communist darling, nationalistic sectarian neoliberal oligarchical monarchy-in-all-but-name Assad regime – and on one of the other hands, we have the Kurdish libertarian socialists who established the autonomous confederation of Rojava. Which of those groups is reactionary, and which is revolutionary? And no, the answer to that is not so simple as “which side does the US support”, especially when we have the Russian Federation playing at imperialism on the opposite side…

Brett, the mobile provision of a quick charge to an electrical vehicle is not a trivial problem. The responder would have to be another electrical vehicle with roughly comparable range, transporting batteries with comparable charge, and the electronics needed to deliver that charge rapidly. A towing service would be more practicable, assuming that a quick charging station is somewhere in the vicinity.

Teslas, I think, have software that can guide them to the nearest Supercharger, and the Plugshare app is available to the rest of us. I think even Google maps has the feature somewhere. It’s not that big a problem for the typical EV. A long trip requires a little planning and some flexibility.

Talking to people I know who have lost their job due to the pandemic, some becoming unemployed for the first time, I realize that this is not just an economic issue. Emotional damage is being done t0 many labor units who were once highly productive workers. Some of these people tell me that it is the constant rejection that saps their ability to continue to look for jobs that match their skill level.

Did you mean ‘Talking to labour units I know … Some of these labour units tell me …’?

stj posted late in the last twigs thread a comment that boiled down to “only Communists are leftists”, which I’d like to interrogate briefly despite the fact that anything but the most charitable reading reduced it to a No True Scotsman fallacy.

Which historical figures count as Communists? Which historical figures count as leftists?

Jean-Paul Marat? Anacharsis Cloots? Tom Paine? Mikhail Bakunin? Kurt Eisner? Eugene Debs? Thomas Rainsborough? John Ball? The Gracchi?

I’ve been driving a Chevy Bolt for nearly 4 years, and I’ve only taken one long trip, from the coast to Palm Springs and back, which was nearly within the vehicle’s range, but not at realistic freeway speeds and dealing with wind, rain and night. On the return I tried driving at a moderate speed for a while, but it was maddening, even dangerous. I wound up charging in Corona (nursing a terrible cup of McDonald’s coffee) and cruised happily home at 80.

Visiting my sister in the San Francisco Bay area would be problematic. Interstate 5 is the direct route, but last I checked there was a worrisome lack of plebeian (non-Tesla) chargers; however, US 101 and Route 99 looked plausible. Things may have improved since then.

A request, rather than a discussion topic: would it be possible to update the blogroll so that 11D and Kevin Drum point to the current locations?

Range & charging. In the ??? future.

“Super solution in hybrid capacitor development
“In a step towards a new type of energy storage, QUT researchers have developed a hybrid supercapacitor that offers the best of both worlds in energy storage.

“However, our device, after being cycled at a high current rate for 10,000 charge/discharges, retained around 90 per cent of its initial storage capacity.”
https://www.qut.edu.au/research/article?id=173028

Article:
“Hybrid supercapacitor offers NiMH energy density, charges much faster

“energy density (Wh/kg), referring to the total amount of energy a device can store per weight, and power density (W/kg), referring to how quickly the device can move power in and out while charging and discharging.” [5x power feed in than current Tesla – e-drag cars coming soon?]

…”Your car or phone battery won’t last as long with one of these on board, but it’ll charge so fast that range might cease to be an issue.”…

“But as Skeleton points out, there are plenty of other applications where these in-between solutions will find their place. They may replace the lead-acid board net batteries that are still required in today’s lithium-powered EVs. They will be excellent for quick-response power-smoothing and peak load management in industrial settings.”
https://newatlas.com/energy/qut-hybrid-supercapacitor/

Study:
“Covalent Graphene‐MOF Hybrids for High‐Performance Asymmetric Supercapacitors
…
…” The cell is able to deliver a power density of up to 16 kW kg−1 and an energy density of up to 73 Wh kg−1, which are comparable to several commercial devices such as Pb‐acid and Ni/MH batteries. Under an intermediate level of loading, the device retained 88% of its initial capacitance after 10 000 cycles.”

…”the pairing of these two materials could generate a novel kind of high voltage aqueous asymmetric supercapacitor (ASC). The asymmetric combination of electrode materials working in different potential windows is an emerging architecture for continuing the improvement of the energy density of supercapacitors. The subsequent energy density of a device is proportional to the square of its operational voltage. The constructed device in this work is operated at up to 1.7 V and demonstrates a strong performance and stable cyclability of over 10 000 cycles.”
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/adma.202004560

If there were some kind of wet cell battery technology that worked as well as Lithium batteries, et al, the solution would be simple. You could pull up to the electrolyte fill station, your old fluid would be drained (to be regenerated and used again), and your battery pack filled up with fresh electrolyte. Unfortunately, wet cell batteries have much lower storage densities, greater weight, and some other (mostly environmental) problems.

I am curious, however, as to what happened to the battery pack swap idea? Battery packs and assorted equipment could be standardized to a single design for all EVs. Drivers wouldn’t own theirs; they are rented and exchanged It would be relatively easy to design an auto-loader device that you could operate with a credit card.

Obviously, I’m no expert on EVs, but in the early days of the latest EV push, this idea seemed to be taken almost as a given as to how the charging process would develop as you reached a certain level of EV saturation.

The road-side charging method, with its delays (under even the best of conditions), seems clunky in comparison.

nastywoman, it appears that three of us drive EV’s, which means it’s a topic on which we can discourse with not only enthusiasm but expertise. Not coincidentally, my family’s text channel is contending the question. My sister has a new Mercedes and her husband has a Porsche, both of which they love, so they are disinclined to think that my brother and I made a better choice in buying electrics.

I live on a busy street, next to the intersection at the top of a hill, so cars and trucks and buses are constantly grinding to a halt and then accelerating away. The dust from brake linings and tires coats every surface in my yard. I take immense satisfaction from the thought that when I slow my descent or come to a stop I’m charging my battery instead of spewing particulate pollution.

William S Berry @ 21

“I am curious, however, as to what happened to the battery pack swap idea? Battery packs and assorted equipment could be standardized to a single design for all EVs.”

If I recall correctly, it floundered because car companies objected – each wanted to maintain their own specific designs which would be incompatible with that of other manufacturers.

”The road-side charging method, with its delays (under even the best of conditions), seems clunky in comparison.”

But surely that depends a lot on the journey? My understanding is that studies suggest the vast majority of trips are within the range of EVs, so a 1 hr charge time would be perfectly acceptable as it could be done at the destination (frequently home or work). For the less common longer trips, this is less than ideal, but I don’t know how much of an issue it really makes.

OTOH, even assuming that there were a universal design (and that there were no issues with swapping – you’d probably need to figure out some scheme integrated with the BMS to have a predicted understanding of the system), I think it would also depend on how easily one could swap the battery? My understanding of modern vehicles is pretty limited, so take this as a thought from someone with little knowledge, but I believe the general design principles tend to make actually accessing the workings somewhat of an issue. It may all be designable, but then the question would be how much time, effort, and additional costs would that cause, and how much of a difference would it make?

I don’t know (EV design and usage is a bit tangential to me), but it might be interesting to hear from EV owners as to how often they worry about the range/charge issue or how often it causes issues (particularly from region to region).

nastywoman 20: „Could anybody tell me what to write back“

How about F#ck off Nazis?

„If I were to have two cars, I’d very much want one to be an electric car that I’d use for the large majority of my small trips around town – to work when I don’t take the tram, to the grocery store, etc.“

There’s a much better solution for that. It’s called e-bike.

Matt @ 26

Apologies, but I found this a little odd (probably I’ve missed the obvious a bit). If I recall correctly, the Tesla Model S is quoted as having EPA estimated 402 miles range – I am, I will admit, a little surprised you would view an additional hour charging time on top of that level of journey as such a great additional burden.

I would agree that it is tricky if you don’t have chargers located in sufficient numbers to enable a such large journeys (assuming you must make it there and back on one charge). On the other hand, I suspect it depends a lot on location though – I think it would be more feasible in Europe, as it is difficult to imagine many places where you would regularly drive more than 400 miles from any electrical outlet.

I would respectfully disagree a little, and say I am unconvinced that the sort of situation you envisage would preclude EVs for the majority of people – but I certainly wouldn’t say that with high confidence, as it is more of a general impression.

hix @ 30

Thanks for the comment – it is interesting to me to see the general thoughts people have on EVs.

I guess, if you were looking, you’d be more interested in something sort of in between a Twizy and a Zoe? Smaller and cheaper than most EVs, but bigger than an e-bike or a microcar?

There are any number of reasons why battery swapping is impractical. In the case of my Chevy Bolt, it entails lifting the passenger compartment off the frame. The batteries run the length of the car in what is described as a skateboard configuration. Moreover, the batteries represent a substantial fraction of the car’s value, on the order of $10k, not something to be casually exchanged. To top it off, some manufacturers are planning to integrate the batteries into the car’s body in order to reduce weight.

I may bore ingenues
with science or engineering
or tales of foreign journeys.
More enjoyable pastimes I disdain.
I was not born generous
nor engendered offspring
or run joggers down.
I’ve mostly worn jeans.

I love my beach town hill top home
and the greenbelt that surrounds it.
The extravagance of agaves amazes me.
My trees yield guavas,
pomegranates, macadamia nuts,
and, yes, oranges.

Matt 32: Most trips are work commutes (unless you are in home office, as I have been for almost a year now). If your work commute is within reach of a bike ride (and the e-bike has greatly extended that reach), then the bike/e-bike is most certainly the best (most efficient, fastest, most sustainable) transportation option, occasionally combined with other modes for situations when the bike is not ideal: mass transit, taxi, car sharing.

Regarding freight transport: the e-bike can transport a lot. Cat litter or a case of wine should really not be a problem. Plenty of people transport their children in bike trailers and those can also be used for freight. Occasionally you may need to rent a vehicle for larger freights. But these kind of problems have been solved. Plenty of people are fine with the e-bike for most of their transportation needs.

I can’t speak to the weather conditions in Melbourne but I’m sure there are plenty of people in your city that have found ways of dealing with those. Bike-friendly infrastructure is a political issue.

I’m aware that not everybody is in the situation of the e-bike being a good option for them. But if those who have that option use it, that will do far more to make the transportation system sustainable than promoting EV-cars. And most certainly the option of buying an EV-car as a second car will do nothing for sustainability whatseoever.