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[Duuvian]

https://thedebrief.org/fully-digital-twin-of-mcity-simulated-urban-environment-for-testing-autonomous-vehicles-now-available-to-download/

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

For optimized testing of vehicles designed to navigate the complex and dangerous situations faced in real-world driving scenarios, the facility was constructed with several aspects of an actual city. According to the Mcity team, these include:

    A simulated downtown area with urban streets.
    A 1,000-foot straightaway, access ramps, a curve, and a traffic circle.
    Multiple road surfaces with a variety of road markings and crossing types.
    Traffic signals and traffic signs.
    A bridge deck, underpass, guardrails, barriers, and crash attenuators.
    A house and garage exterior with an accessibility ramp for first-mile/last-mile testing, deliveries, and ride-hailing.

The newly available Mcity simulation includes all of the same obstacles and environments as the actual facility, allowing remote researchers to test their systems in the same environment and under the same varied conditions. The digital twin also incorporates the TeraSim open-source traffic simulator, which the Mcity team developed.

Yes! I hope there are mods for this!

A fully digital twin of the real-world Mcity autonomous vehicle test facility located on the University of Michigan campus is now available for AV vehicle developers to download.

Awwwww! Here what about these!?

Spoiler: E-Scorts (click to show/hide)

[Truean]

Please do not quote

Hum, even Star Trek had Picard growing on his land with full on replicators. https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Ch%C3%A2teau_Picard so I think more arguments saying something isn't practical / workable is just misapplied. Especially when I've already said it isn't presently practical or workable because we don't have the tech and would need to R  & D it a lot.

Semi utopian Science Fiction aside, even in any interpretation of the hopeful example(s) given here, they'd still provide solar power at least, and that doesn't account for fiber crops. Same with the supposition that even after 20/30 more years of research in better hydroponics/aeroponics, widespread adoption would take a while, and that's if society adopts it. May never happen and again is presently impossible. There's other arguments a more enlightened society could make for farming, even if it somehow achieved post scarcity, which would be incredibly difficult at best and may be practically impossible at worst. (producing food for preservation, etc). You'd likely have some crops doing better in fields than hydroponics )even if we had that) like wheat, corn, etc.

I don't think society would ever even be able to consider getting rid of farmers, or would want to. Resource production helps; they do that. If climate change really screws over large areas, some other disaster happens, or space colonization/asteroid mining happens, more food sources able to be done in different circumstances help.

Probably a misapplication to think farmers would be going anywhere, even if the hoped for future advances in hydroponics/aeroponics  happen in 20 ish / 30ish years. I performed a root analysis of multiple reasons preventing something presently as impossible, and hoping those individual causes could be solved, while taking others' views into account. I agreed with some opposition views and explained why I didn't agree with others. Sadly, it seems the internet isn't used to that as an alternative to just saying, "nope not possible."

It's sad there's a lot of incorrect "either/or" and "fixed pie" thinking rather than trying for solution suggestions. I'm afraid societies are  going to keep right on defaulting to cruelty, because it is easier. From there, we'll keep justifying that cruelty and say some group(s) of people "deserve" the bad things done to them.

People either want magic solutions that are easy, cheap, and require no effort, while making the rich richer or an excuse to blame  others and do things that suck and probably harm people somehow. It is tragically how the world works and it explains a lot.

We just had a presidential election the winner said he won on groceries. Talking about subsidies, food growing methods or discussing some way to feed people wasn't nuts in that context.

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[martinuzz]

Aww bah, a car drove into a new years' crowd in New Orleans. At least 10 dead and 30 wounded. The perpetrator got out of his car after the act and started shooting. The police opened fire as well. It is unknown what happened to the assailant. The police says they have not arrested anyone, but if this means he got away or he was shot dead is unclear.

[McTraveller]

I don't think we'll ever be able to replace farms with home-scale hydroponics, regardless of technical advances.  My hypothesis is this merely trades the "food distribution" problem for the "hydroponic feedstock, energy, and waste distribution" problem.  If you can't get groceries, how are you going to get the Brawndo to feed your plants?

Put another way: technology will not and cannot fix social problems. Technology is merely a catalyst and will typically just amplify the prevailing cultural tendencies.

The politics is: are we going to be a culture that bullies people into getting what we want, or a culture that cooperates and helps? Do we try to use our resources collectively or merely transactionally? How do you shift from bullying to cooperation, without using force?

[Maximum Spin]

The politics is: are we going to be a culture that bullies people into getting what we want, or a culture that cooperates and helps? Do we try to use our resources collectively or merely transactionally? How do you shift from bullying to cooperation, without using force?

That, and the deeper and harsher fact - that cultures which do exploit can beat cultures which don't, if they fight on level ground - so that the only way to preserve a culture which doesn't exploit is to find and keep some other kind of advantage. This is really the thing we haven't figured out yet... it's not that there isn't enough will to cooperate, it's that nobody seems to understand HOW - in the absence of a frank acceptance of what it means to choose to forgo short-term benefits.

[Truean]

Please do not quote

Tech could fix or worsen social problems, or create whole new ones. Tech is tool; application of tool influences result. Applied wide scale, can impact social problems (for good or ill).

Right now, cooperation, change, or compromise incredibly difficult. No solutions, so we blame and justify bad decisions. Observe budget crisis that just almost shut down government. Only facing DIRE consequences resulted in anything. On whole, we can't agree on what to do, so we fight over who to blame, who to punish, cut, and whatever bad thing.... Focus should be constructive: building things producing resources. Sadly, it isn't.
Alternatives using less bullying are shouted down. People are VERY VERY reluctant to do it, 

1.) Ideological compromise. America was built on a "great compromise." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connecticut_Compromise#:~:text=The%20Connecticut%20Compromise%2C%20also%20known,under%20the%20United%20States%20Constitution. Yes it had problems. Nobody was 100% happy but things got done with problems.

God help anyone seeking compromise today in politics. Republicans split and attack their own, between A.) Trump lovers and haters (among Republicans). Result https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liz_Cheney of all people is now semi exiled; her father defined the party.... B.) Big fight between Steve Bannon and Elon Musk https://thehill.com/policy/technology/5061472-steve-bannon-elon-musk-visas/ Meanwhile, the democrats have an establishment verses the new blood. https://www.yahoo.com/news/74-old-democrat-gives-pathetic-171406993.html

2.) Outright Blame [insert group here]: We are led to demonize each other for the ultra richs' gain. Unproductive. Why do the Republicans hate and pass laws against transgender individuals, especially recently, because it was politicized. Fear resulted in election wins for those that used it, and as usual, nobody has a plan to actually do jack. The actual trap is Ultra-rich provided illusion of choice with two party system while controlling both parties and turning us against us. Meanwhile, ultra-rich profits at our loss. Middle class shrinks.

3.) Bad communication and lack of emotional intelligence. Used to tutor. Had NRA members loving lessons to their kids about guns honestly presenting the other side of things and the counter to the other side, in addition to some of their own argument's weaknesses. The veteran groups and knowledge of firearm mechanics and safety probably didn't hurt their opinion of me. Similarly, had liberal parents who also liked my lessons on the same topics. It was amazing how common ground was reached, over 20 years ago.... Now.... Good luck. Things have gotten bad....

A failing system produced McMansions with useless 3 story high ceiling living rooms. Prices skyrocketed. Many empty nest boomers now need to downsize. Gen X, Millennials, and beyond just can't afford it. It's a mess and it didn't really help people.

So what could we do:

Multiple options exist. None are perfect; all have costs (money, time, aggravation, compromise). So rejection occurs. 

1.) Focus on building people's skills, abilities and characteristics. Combats "useless people" false narrative. Impractical, student loans are an imploding nightmare. Education has problems. Nobody wants to deal with it. We could have virtual reality simulations teaching skills like welding or any task (focusing on safety and technique) before giving real world drills for actual use of skills but we don't.
2.) Focus on things that create resources/sustainability. This can include suboptimal sources if overall resource generation is increased/other support expense is decreased. Impractical, lawns don't grow food and require mowing. We won't even use lawn clippings as livestock food. We could put bags on mowers, collect clippings and ship to farmers, mix in grass clippings with livestock feed, but nope.... (It would cut down farmers' / ranchers' expense).
3.) Build capacity into systems: This is absolutely hated by those who call it waste and want to operate on razor thin margins and firing everyone possible. If the few people left get sick or you unexpectedly get slammed with work, there's no capacity because everyone got fired. (See #1 above with "skills abilities and characteristics).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00npeUY_1Vg

We could focus on building and investing with return on investment. Instead we're focusing on cutting. "For efficiency." Lies. All that cutting just benefits the ultra rich sitting on dragon hoards of wealth.
The middle class has been and will be hurt bad.

Billionaires are scary and have recently threatened even members of Congress. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c3rqv248pxpo So the average person has no real chance alone against them as things stand.

That stated, the only things an individual or small groups of individuals can do is to focus on doing what society should be doing, but isn't. Resource creation and cooperation.... Reducing grocery bills through growing food at home and making any organic waste (food scraps) into soil. Putting multiple people on a cell phone bill as a "family plan," so you're each paying $50 for the best service instead of $110 each. Cooking/planning large inexpensive meals to share. Child care provision. Clothing repair and creation. No, none of it is as efficient as a specialized, incredibly well financed agribusiness,  telecommunication, food processing, daycare or textile mill would be. Not the point if it would result in net savings. "But wait that's socialism...." I offered to let my nephew stay with me for no rent while building him up money, skills, connections, etc. No dice. Why? Ok go pay how many hundreds to some landlord instead of $0. There's a cultural expectation you turn 18 and are magically out in whatever (usually bad) condition you happen to be in). This screwed millennials and will likely screw Gen Z and then Gen Alpha. A future should be built for them that sets them up to succeed (even if it wasn't done for us) rather than tossing them into a start with debt or few prospects .... It isn't happening, sadly.

The problem is, who the hell can you trust? Far too many people are so screwed over, angry, otherwise desperate, or all of the above.

Please do not quote

[Maximum Spin]

Speaking as a farmer, please don't try to send me your lawn clippings. If you're lucky enough that your lawn clippings aren't tainted with pesticide and herbicide residues and God knows what microplastics or pollutants, just compost them at home and apply them back to your own lawn or a home garden. The money and energy it will cost to collect them and ship them is much more than they're worth.

[Robot Parade Leader]

Speaking as a farmer, please don't try to send me your lawn clippings. If you're lucky enough that your lawn clippings aren't tainted with pesticide and herbicide residues and God knows what microplastics or pollutants, just compost them at home and apply them back to your own lawn or a home garden. The money and energy it will cost to collect them and ship them is much more than they're worth.

I'm not even gonna say anything except grass clippings make sense, yeah as long as they're clean. Livestock eat grass.
Throw some bags on an empty train car/ or empty truck. She's at least trying and it looks reasonable. Basically hay.

Cows
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/9VSQF05DGP4
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/F4NeUrGVOlw

Goats
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqnwQ3pitCQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSAR7QTBdag

General livestock
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_jQeluksYc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgO05VKtoRU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aK1QMlBHmM

[Starver]

I probably know a lot less about hay-making than Spin, but I'm fairly confident that (even without all the possible contaominant issues), the 'harvesting' of lawn-grass produces something (or, indeed, a number of different somethings, as everybody's "chucked on a truck" individual loads of lawn-shavings are necessarily blended together) that's not really compatible for use in hay-baling.

Maybe somewhat more so for silage, but I share doubts about the QC process that'd be needed to filter out typical "green bin" junk. Even just sending garden waste to (biochemical) digesters needs a certain amount of sifting and sorting to filter out things that shouldn't be in there but are so easy to feed into the collection process.

Random litter (finely chopped or not), woody/sharp plant material, animal faeces and those various garden chemicals innocently added to improve or restrain the growth of various plants, suppress pests, etc.


(It's bad enough that helium-inflated foil balloons can deflate and land in the middle of a crop, along with lighter fly-tipped wastes getting blown there, and the rest...)

[Maximum Spin]

Some common weeds found in many lawns are toxic to livestock.

Please, don't do it. Grass isn't just all the same.

[Robot Parade Leader]

Speaking as a farmer, please don't try to send me your lawn clippings. If you're lucky enough that your lawn clippings aren't tainted with pesticide and herbicide residues and God knows what microplastics or pollutants, just compost them at home and apply them back to your own lawn or a home garden. The money and energy it will cost to collect them and ship them is much more than they're worth.

Some common weeds found in many lawns are toxic to livestock.

Please, don't do it. Grass isn't just all the same.

Wow. So don't cut the grass before the animals eat it?
No idea is good enough. Abandon all hope all ye who enter here. Wow, just find something to disagree on?
Cherry pick one small part of the post made and latch on I guess.... The post was about how nobody can agree...
It's too techy or too simple, so the answer is no, always to any suggestion made. Why bother?
Even growing grass is just ... not doable, because it's "Toxic."  ...? Something something "pollutants."

Lots of video of it working in real time from real farmers with no connection to us: not good enough.
The lawn and clippings in those videos are magic and special. The guy on the mower is a wizard.
The grass "isn't just all the same."

Our lawns are "toxic" messes somehow with pesticides (even if you don't use any), but those are never used on farms.... They are, a lot, there's a ton of pesticide and herbicide used on those large farms.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0166445X24000225
So, don't let your dog or kids play on your lawns? Those grass stains are probably from lawns with pesticides?
"Common weeds" "found in many lawns" can be toxic, but livestock animals have been eating just fine forever?

Don't ask where these "common weeds" came from or have been. Don't ask how did horses, cows, goats, and all the other livestock animals get along if these "common weeds," are so "toxic?" After all they're "common." Why do the deer and rabbits and everything else in our yards not get sick if "common" things are toxic?

Hay can also have occasional toxic plants in there and they get isolated. Hay fields aren't magic, "hayfield is a general name given to any field which has been planted with a grass or legume or a combination of grasses and or legumes with the purpose of harvesting the plants for use as food (hay) for livestock or allowing livestock to graze in that field."
 
https://www2.dnr.state.mi.us/publications/pdfs/huntingwildlifehabitat/landowners_guide/Resource_Dir/Acrobat/Hayfields.PDF

 I gave a lot of of videos before but here's more:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAMatAahN6I
INEXPENSIVE Livestock DROUGHT FEED HACK!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nIcfh2UqV8

"How to make a hay from grass clippings."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Htt9_dwVgUU

Look at the comments section praising it:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

We hay (with an old school scythe) about 1/5 acre dedicated Rabbit Hay plot to get 14 rabbit breeders through Winter - three cuttings, all three put up for Winter feed ... but from May through Oct we just dry our lawn clippings from the lawn around the house like this.  For 6 months lawn waste makes up about 40% of their daily feed.

This is what I've been looking for. What kind of grass seed is your lawn? Fescue? Kentucky Blue?
*Hi Linda, I am in Europe - donīt know Fescue, Kentucky Blue - our lawn is from meadow grass. Iīm sure it would sell under some name in your area too. Good luck :-) Jana

A conventional residential lawn mower grinds the grass into small pieces, which reduces its useful shelf life as animal feed. The finer you grind up organic material, the faster it will decompose. Ideally, hay should be cut in such a way that the grass is cut near the ground and left intact. I would recommend either cutting it by hand with a scythe or using a sickle bar mower.
*Thank you for your comment. I have classic mower, clipping are aprox. 4cm - 1.5inch long. My mini sheep preffer mower hay over commercial bail. They are healthy, I give them mower hay now 13th year. In com. bail there are not so many grasses as they have from our meadow lawn. When they eat bail they leave many grasses on the ground  while mower hay they eat to the last piece. And I have 2 in 1 - nicely cut lawn and happy healthy sheep. The mower hay is also key important for me to keep sheep without teeth alive as long as possible. For them it is much easier to chew it by their gums and highly nutritious. The last is the storage, it can be compressed and takes less space. Cutting grass by hand....Honestly - I am lazy to do that in such quantities that I need... 😃

SIMPLE & FREE Food Source for Your Animals!  (Posted 6 years ago with 0 complaints).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5A8iMoZq0Y

Obviously you want no litter in there and for it to be clean.
Just wow. Why am I responding? Nothing said is good enough.

[Starver]

I think the point is that while dedicated agriculture isn't perfect (though they do specifically and deliberately target such problem 'inter-crop' weeds as ragwort), the issue with (as someone suggested) everyone throwing a bag or two of their own garden-clippings to be 'donated' as feedstock is that this will most likely contain not only garden weeds (plants the gardener doesn't want, but either can't effectively excise from their lawn or only does cut it back by the actual mowing itself) but non-weeds (plenty of garden plants are very much not suitable for fodder).

And a farm that practices stockfree agriculture will be able to do different things from one that maintains livestock and/or the various types of pastures to sustain them. In ways that wouldn't occur to gardeners who might or might not realise that their ant-powder or slug pellets or algaecide might have effects further along the chain. (If you accidentally kill off a bit of your lawn, through injudicious use of controls by you might deal with it, or even think it's not your fault. Meanwhile...)

I believe this radio sketch is actually somewhat relevent to this discussion, as well. Although, even if not, it's still rather clever.

[Strongpoint]

Wow, thinking that random videos of farmers saying something with minimal context can substitute knowledge and experience... Have you ever had any animals? Do you know anything about agriculture or rural life? Did you speak to a farmer once?

Lots of video of it working in real time from real farmers with no connection to us

Those farmers use their own grass, grass they know is safe and clean. Should you try to bring them some random mixed urban grass and feed it to their animals their reaction will be violent.

You don't understand how easy it is to cause a deadly bloat (or worse) with one bad batch of grass.

Also, just because some guy makes a YouTube video with some great lifehack, it doesn't necessarily mean they know what they are doing

So, don't let your dog or kids play on your lawns? Those grass stains are probably from lawns with pesticides?

Playing on and eating are very different categories. I can guarantee you that eating lawn grass won't end well for a kid.

"After all they're "common." Why do the deer and rabbits and everything else in our yards not get sick if "common" things are toxic?

Short answer - they do get mildly sick. Longer answer. Free animal has more choice in choosing what to eat and grazers have a strong instinct to not eat a lot of the same plant, especially if it is an unfamiliar plant. They move on. Animal you feed has no such luxury and it is your duty to know which plants are safe and which are not.

[bloop_bleep]

The essential problem is this: as the theoretical upper limit of labor productivity increases, it becomes less and less efficient to even house, even feed, even have people who are operating at far below this level. The corollary of Ford's thesis that people who make Model Ts should be paid enough to afford them is: people who don't make Model Ts and don't contribute directly to making them don't need to be able to afford them.

Cool. It sounds like all the capitalists who exist only to parasitize the lion's share of global production whose level of labor productivity is close to zero would be the first order of concern right? That would be the obvious conclusion of what you're saying. Surely that's what you would pay your overwhelming attention to when you're "just making harsh observations" about so-called "useless people"?

The problem with all this discussion about who we can afford to let live is that we live in a post-scarcity society. This scene-making Maximum Spin does about how a janitor must starve because China raised the price of steel does not exist. There is ABSOLUTELY NO REASON, material, social, or economic, that ANYONE cannot have their basic needs met. Again: *ABSOLUTELY NO REASON*, and no flowery pontification about this or that artifical economic construction should let anyone be distracted from that basic fact. All shortage is a result of capital extraction, and if it ends up that a janitor starves because China raises steel prices it is only a consequence of capital extraction, not some incontrovertible sequence of cause and effect.

To right-wingers like Maximum Spin capitalism is like religion. A janitor starving because the system decided he was worthless doesn't mean the system was constructed incorrectly. No, it is because the janitor had to starve, he must starve, like it was ordained by the laws of physics, even if right next door there are ten tons of food rotting away.

The self-satisfied, light-hearted treatisizing Maximum Spin does about how he believes other people are worthless because they do not serve his beloved system correctly (yes, even if couched in observatorial language out of cowardice) is not a sober-minded evaluation of economic consequences but a rationalization of an inhumane value system that would ostracize them from polite society if they were to express it plainly.

[Truean]

Please do not quote

I said all that and the only thing that got cherry picked from it was the offhanded suggestion to grow livestock feed some ... how? I disfavor lawns that don't grow some kind of something useful: veggies, something. Whatever. It's wasted space and decoration you have to mow. I love how all the other parts of it just, got nothing.

Honestly, why do you respond to him? There are no circumstances that could change his mind, no matter what. Just let him say his ridiculous things and let him make himself look bad?

Conservative cherry picks conversation about disagreeing, and says livestock can't eat grass so he can disagree with transwoman.
-Film at 11....

Woman (Sadly pronounced "Hey you!") : Unappreciated noun: "Someone men often unjustly disagree with. She makes it work anyhow."

Love the sketch about daffodils and goats.

There's got to be a way to sort through for things just like how you can sort recyclables.... O no, are we're doomed?

My post about nobody being able to disagree got proven right by disagreement, cherry picked, and lots else. O well. Please see below.

I get the impression you might be upset. I hope you're not as that is absolutely not what I'm trying to do. Please do not be upset. Please do not think I'm trying to upset you. I really would rather not.

Youtube is not a perfect source; I've posted scholarly peer review journals and people here hated it for no reason.
Youtube videos only show it's possible (guy cutting grass; animal on film eating it) and publicly available comments, not that it's best.
Importantly, no opposition source was provided. So weigh some cited source against no source. Cause, no opposition source was given.
Further, consider the comments on those videos. Why did nobody raise an objection there? Again, I'm the last person to say youtube is somehow a perfect source. It has flaws, but someone just declaring themselves right without source or reason doesn't work.
Has this ever been studied? There has to be a veterinary medicine journal about it?

If the kid is a goat, the lawn eating could go well if there aren't any daffodils. But I see part of your point. In the same breath, I think the assumption of just a plethora of "toxins," "pollutants," "chemicals," isn't exactly well founded either. Somehow what I said got twisted into "just shove whatever into the animal's mouth." I never said that. Quality control is a thing. If we even did this, then care could be taken to actually grow it instead of just throw crap away. Somehow, a crap 0 quality was assumed. Someone mentioned "Random litter" The worst was just assumed without reason. I honestly don't know why people assumed I would ever mean that wouldn't have to be filtered out or not accepted.

Wow, the intention of an off handed remark was to theoretically produce something useful and helpful. Dovetailing into my prior points about growing things in yards, it could be alfalfa, or patches of dedicated livestock feed crops, or who knows.

http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=162538.msg8565481#msg8565481

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Make a modular greenhouse like plastic sheet (recycled plastic if possible but whatever) that would cover this 10 x 10 unit to keep the birds from eating what you plant. That and/or make a smaller version that can be moved on wheels to move it into or out of the sun. There's another billion dollar idea."

The point is it was an idea with a good intention behind it got taken way out of context, again.... I don't think it was your fault Strongpoint.  No one is saying anyone would have to do anything. Nothing is past an original theory stage at best. Heck, I just think there's SOMETHING we could do that would be practical and helpful. At least thinking about that is better than not caring at all. Even if I'm wrong about being able to grow something, I personally would not be opposed to government subsidies to farmers to have them grow more food if that ended up being the best way. Of course, I'm afraid the current political climate won't result in people voting for that.

Please do not quote