If there is life out there, it would be rather unspectular. It would exist in the form of microbes, probably not even visible by the human eye. There are theories that suggest that there is a high chance of life on Enceladus.

One of the reasons that life could develop into complexity on Earth is that it could develop over the course of millions of years relatively undisturbed. There were no outside events like supernovae that swept Earth out of exsistence. The Primordial Soup could be cooked long enough to result in complex and intelligent life forms. Other places in the universe probaply have not that advantage, so that the development of life didn’t come that far yet.

I suspect that there is a higher chance that life in other places of the universe will be tainted by humanity than the other way round.

I don’t know how the procedere would be executed, but I imagine that police could have the phone present during an interrogation and try to nlock it there (possibly by making you to look at the phone to unlock it, if the phone has been set up to unlock this way). Once unlocked, it would be sufficient to have a peek into the camera roll or messages, until the phone locks again. I don’t know about the law, but I can imagine that if a police officer had a look into your phone, even briefly, it may be held against the one who is being interrogated.

Once rebooted, you need to enter your PIN to unlock the phone (and the SIM as well). Before that it is not possible to unlock the phone with biometric credentials (face ID or fingerprint).

As far as I’m aware, police can force you to hand over your biometric credentials (they can hold the phone to your face to unlock it when you have face ID enabled, or can move your finger to the fingerprint sensor). But they can’t force you to reveal the PIN number.

I just read the (German) Wikipedia article about Transnistria. The article states:

Als einziges Land der Erde hat Transnistrien Münzen aus Kunststoff im Umlauf. (Transnistria is the only country in the world to have plastic coins in circulation.)

This is an odd choice of material. Can you elaborate on that? Why plastic instead of metal?

something about leopards and faces

This is a 1972 documentary about the life in the year 2000. It is in German, but English subtitles can be set up in the video settings. It turned out to be a bit different, but some predictions back then came to reality.

It was solved for a brief time. Now people have these plastic coins you sometimes recieve as a promotional gift and since it is not a real coin, people stop putting the carts to the corral. You can witness this every time holidays are coming up and people are stocking their groceries. And the culprit is always middle-aged Karens who also don’t indicate when leaving the parking lot in their SUV.

Simplified:

Having a fridge running is nothing complicated compared to a computer. The compressor and the light inside are the only things that are being powered. Both components work mechanically: The compressor has an electric motor that is running when fed with electricity. Pistons inside the compressor are linked mechanically to the electric motor. The light inside the fridge is operated with a switch that is mecahanically connected to the door. The light is off when the door is closed. As long as electricity is fed to the fridge, it keeps running.

Computers however are more complicated, as they basically are running clocks that connect an event with a time stamp. They can get disturbed easily when several events happen. When a computer is running long enough it can happen that the memory overflows when a specific event is being executed for example. For this reason it is renommended that your smartphone is supposed to be restarted at least one a month, otherwise it couldn’t function properly.

If refrigerators were operated the same way as a computer, like your laptop or smartphone, I bet it has to be restarted every once in a while, otherwise a malfunction would occur. To my knowledge refrigerators are built the same like 40 years ago, albeit with more efficient compressors, better insulation and less harmful refrigerant.

It’s a snat. They are not easy to catch, because they are fast. Also, they never land on their shell.

It looks like a male specimen of Tegenaria domestica. Its habitat spreads over Europe, Asia and Northern America. They are harmless to humans.

It’s not that this lifestyle isn’t socially acceptable, but it comes with some disadvantages. As pointed out by others, if you have a partner that is living an opposite lifestyle (“normal” day time work - night time sleep) you both wouldn’t have that much time together being awake and active. Also, another disadvantage is that everyone else is active during your resting time, which is during the day. Loud neighbors, traffic, socializing, etc. Errands, like appointments, are often possible only during daytime.

Attending a nocturnal lifestyle over an extended period of time is also less healthy from the biological point of view.

If your biological preference is set to be nocturnal however, and you can compensate for the aforementioned disadvantages, go for it. Nobody will be judging you.

it’s generally super weird how everyone tries really hard to convince you that you are wrong about it

My theory is that (volontary) childless people are less predictable to others. If you only have to take care of yourself, you need less resources (read: money) for that. An employer that knows his employee has children to care for can be treated worse in terms of working conditions and salary/ wages, because the employer knows that this employee can’t afford to quit the job, because of the responsibility for the child(ren).

If an emloyee is known to have no children, it makes him unpredictable. He could get up after a good yelling at the workplace, say “fuck it” and leave. He only has to take care for himself. Also, that employee can accumulate more money since it has not to be spent on the needs of children. That means, the employee has a bigger and longer lasting financial cushion.

Something similar applies when credits/ loans have to be paid. Having debt is a considered a “good” thing, since people are less prone to quit their jobs. On a personal level, the goal should be to become debt free as soon as possible. Not only it will result in financial freedom, it will also enhance your “fuck-it-ablilty”.

Another theory for those convincing people is that they envy your lifestyle of tranquility and spontaneousness. These people have been bullied into having children by their peer groups, because “that is the thing to do”, and “you owe grandchildren”. There are so many parents out there who would be better off if they never had children, but their relatives had convinced them otherwise.

It seems that those aged roughly between 30 - 50 hit the sweet spot when it comes to computer literacy.

There is an interesting text about it, albeit it is 11 years old already: Kids can’t use computers… and this is why it should worry you

Really? My laptop doesn’t. Maybe it depends on if the battery is designed to be removed by customer or if it is hidden inside the laptop, making it accessible only with tools.

Since laptops are equipped with a battery anyway, they lack of a coin cell (mostly a CR2032 cell) to keep track of time. This means that your laptop will not be able to estimate the correct time and date when powered with energy outside of the original battery, and these settings have to be made manually each time your laptop will be used.

It will work fine without the correct time set, but you might have issues with files that are created “in the future” (from your laptops perspective).

I have an old laptop (still in use occasionally, because I have a scanner that is too old to be operated with current software) where I replaced its battery once. The sign the battery was dead was that the OS issued a warning the laptop was not able to tell the correct time.

Yes. I’d rather smash my femur at a pop up headlight while lounching over the engine hood than being dragged underneath an SUV street tank and being squashed.

The technology behind telecommunication.

Today everything happens inside your router, fast and silent. My father was a telecommunications engineer. When I was a amall boy (late 1980s) he once took me to his workplace (it was in the evening and he was supposed to troubleshoot). What today fits onto a few silicone chips inside a router took much more space back them.

I was in a room that was filled with several wardsobe-sized cabinets. Inside there were hundreds of electro-mechanical relays that were in motion, spinning and clicking, each time someone in the city dialed a number (back then rotary phones were quite common). It was quite loud. There also was a phone receptor inside one of the cabinets where one could tap into an established connection, listening into the conversation two strage people had (it was for checking if a connectiion works).

I still remeber the distinct “electrical” smell of that room (probably hazardous vapors from long forbidden cable insulation and other electrical components).

So when you dialed a number at one place with your rotary phone, you were able to move some electro-mechanical parts at another place that could be located somewhere else around the globe (hence long distance calls).

A 1991 Ford Sierra that I bought for 100,- from a friend because I needed a car quickly. This car was already promised to be shipped to Nigeria, where Europe dumps all the old cars. It still had 3 months until the next savety inspection, which the car certainly would have failed.

The engine was still OK, but the car had some electrical issues. When using the turn signal first, and then using the brake pedal, all lights and electrical load were going bonkers, resulting in flickering and failure. The car had to be stopped and the key had to be removed in order to switch it off. Then the car could be started again and one could resume driving.

In order to avoid this issues, it was crucial to use the break pedal first, and then the turning signal, right before turning. This way the electrical issues ware not that severe - the issues stopped, wenn dis-enganging the turn signal.

Also, the doors central locking system was not working properly. Only the passenger door was operational. When I wanted to get the trunk hatch to open, I had to unlock the passenger’s door, reach inside to open the driver’s door from the inside. Then I had to walk around to fully open the driver’s door in order to pull the lever for the trunk hatch that is located next to the driver’s seat.

I only had this car for two months. One day I put the car into neutral at a traffic light. After that, there was a strange noise. I put it into first gear and the clutch refused to connect to the power train. The clutch failed, the car couldn’t be moved by its own. It went to the scrap yard.

I live in Germany.