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Cake day: January 1st, 2024

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  • nickiwest@lemmy.worldtoScience Memes@mander.xyzLiquid Trees
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    27 days ago

    Even with ideal light conditions, there’s still more to consider.

    I lived in Louisville for many years. It’s fairly green as cities go. In older parts of the city, trees had been planted between the streets and sidewalks … definitely a long time ago, maybe 30 to 50 years? Maybe longer?

    Every spring, we lost a number of those trees to thunderstorms. Enough rain, followed by strong winds, would topple multiple trees. Every single one that I saw had a root ball that was exactly the size of the opening where it had been planted, so maybe two square meters and maybe a meter or two deep. (For those keeping score at home, that’s not enough root volume to support a full-sized tree.)

    So we’d lose those lovely trees and on a good day, we’d lose the use of the street for a while. On a bad day, someone would lose a car or a chunk of their house.

    “Just plant more trees in the middle of the city” is not the brilliant fix that many people seem to think it is.
















  • As a teacher, I have a really strong aversion to framing this as a simple battle between states.

    What you’re talking about may well come to pass, but in reality what it means is that an entire generation of children in poor states – through no fault of their own, but solely because of the geography of their birth – will be woefully undereducated and therefore not competitive in the university admissions process or the job market.

    Whatever face-feasting-leopard karma we think the adults who voted for Republicans might deserve, their children should have the right to a proper education rather than be saddled with a legacy of poverty and ignorance. And in your scenario it’s apparently going to be up to the blue states to care enough about these kids to help ensure their rights.



  • I grew up in the Assemblies of God denomination. When I graduated from high school, I left home to go to college, expanded my horizons, and ultimately ended up deconstructing my religious beliefs. I have considered myself to be an atheist for more than 20 years, but I still have strong ethical beliefs that basically parallel the Christian teachings of empathy for the marginalized and the disadvantaged.

    For the past 8 years, I’ve watched my “decent Christian” family slide further and further into Trumpism. They are unrecognizable as the people who taught me the value of Christlike behavior.

    Most days, I feel like I’m a better Christian than they are. I’ve wondered for a long time how the same people who instilled those values in me have been led so far astray.

    I recognize in hindsight that they were motivated by fear of God rather than love for their fellow humans. Fox News and Trump have preyed on that fear and gradually expanded it until it has turned to hatred of anyone who doesn’t look or vote like them.