U.S. Life Expectancy Falls Further - <AUTHOR> https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-life-expectancy-falls-further-1543467660 <comment><USER3> If you can't read the original article: [https://outline.com/nzuAst](https://outline.com/nzuAst)

<comment><USER4> You can also prefix any WSJ links (among others) with "facebook.com/l.php?u=" to receive content reserved for users arriving from Facebook; that is, if you don't mind Facebook tracking.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I can think of a few other causes like sickness being a potentially bankrupting event so people don't go to a doctor when they should or too late.

This apparently is a risk, even if you have insurance because you are at the mercy of insurers not tossing you out over such whimsical reasons as pre- existing conditions or other bureaucratic tricks they use to kill their customers rather than getting them cured.

There are also these mafia extortion schemes that are completely legal where you have to pay through your nose for insurance in exchange for the privilege of not being charged tens of thousands of dollars for completely routine stuff like broken bones or other things that can and will go wrong for most people at some point. This is not a thing in most modern countries other than the US. Even many third world countries tend to get organized on this front to the best of their abilities.

Then there is the widespread obesity because of corn syrup being a heavily subsidized food ingredient (got to help those poor republican voting farmers). Also it seems there is a whole legislative game around shameless advertising on products where products that contain obscene amounts of corn syrup are advertised as "fat free" instead of "don eat this you stupid fat F __* ".

The reason for the drug overdoses is decades of shameless attempts by big pharma to coerce the US government on not cracking down on their quite successful attempts at selling heroine disguised as pain medication roughly at the same time when the war on drugs was a big thing. This too is much less of a thing outside of the US where pain medication tends to be very strictly regulated and not advertised every 10 minutes on TV.

In short, the above is the result of decades of misguided policies, failures to regulate, and greedy companies getting away with stuff they shouldn't get away with and lobbying successfully to get away with ever more.

<comment><USER6> > Then there is the widespread obesity because of corn syrup being a heavily > subsidized food ingredient

You forgot to mention that the US Gov't also subsides the other side via food stamps, which poor folks use to purchase corn syrup and cheap grain foods, further exasperating the obesity epidemic. It's true insanity.

<comment><USER7> "... which poor folks use to purchase corn syrup and cheap grain foods ..."

This is true. It is truly insane that public food benefits can be used to buy soft drinks, sugar cereals and candy:

"Soft drinks, candy, cookies, snack crackers, and ice cream are food items and are therefore eligible items"[1]

[1] [https://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/eligible-food- items](https://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/eligible-food-items)

<comment><USER8> It doesn't seem insane to me, just a reflection of the reality that people sometimes buy unhealthy foods - for both legit and frivolous reasons.

Sometimes your kid will only eat sugary cereals for breakfast, because children can be fussy eaters. Or maybe you want to kick back with a can of Coke after a hard day at work (or need the caffeine to wake up for work in the morning, and coffee is too expensive). Or you want some Snickers bars to take on the train or bus to snack on. Policing what kind of food people spend their food stamps on seems like a pointless waste of time and government resources to me.

<comment><USER9> Let me guess...American? Because coming from outside, the way you pile sugar into everything (including breakfast) is just insane and aa little stomach churning.

Obviously it's a bit nurture on both our parts, but sugar for breakfast is crazy, as is being taught that things like soda or snickers should ever be eaten except for in exceptional/celebratory circumstances.

One needs to be taught that those food stuffs are acceptable and gain a palette for them, because foreigners find your food sickly sweet. Clearly this is a policy/cultural thing...

<comment><USER8> Guessed wrong! I do live in the US at present, however.

> Obviously it's a bit nurture on both our parts, but sugar for breakfast is > crazy, as is being taught that things like soda or snickers should ever be > eaten except for in exceptional/celebratory circumstances.

There's always a gap between how things should be done and how they are actually done. I personally don't eat sugary cereals, or drink soda. I like sweets and candy and I'll admit it's a struggle to control sometimes, especially when I'm stressed out. I won't judge someone in far worse circumstances than I for indulging in sugar - it might be the only good thing in their life. And I don't approve of government resources being spent on checking what kind of food people eat - you can get far more bang for your buck elsewhere.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The decline is mostly the product of an increase in drug overdose deaths and suicides (likely also related to drug abuse[1]). Cancer mortality is continuing to decline which is nice to hear:

"Earlier this century, the steady and robust decline in heart-disease deaths more than offset the rising number from drugs and suicide, Dr. Anderson said. Now, "those declines aren't there anymore," he said, and the drug and suicide deaths account for many years of life lost because they occur mostly in young to middle-aged adults.

While progress against deaths from heart disease has stalled, cancer deaths—the nation's No. 2 killer—are continuing a steady decline that began in the 1990s, Dr. Anderson said. "That's kind of our saving grace," he said. "Without those declines, we'd see a much bigger drop in life expectancy."

Drug-overdose deaths skyrocketed between 2015 and 2017, particularly for adults between ages 25 and 54. The main culprit was fentanyl and other synthetic opioids that became pervasive in illicit drug supplies in the U.S. around that time.

Deaths from synthetic opioids rose 45% in 2017, while the death rate from heroin, which had risen sharply after 2010, was flat."

[1] [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4499285/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4499285/)

<comment><USER11> > The decline is mostly the product of an increase in drug overdose and > suicides

The US is pretty much also the only country where suicides are increasing.

<comment><USER12> Suicide rates in several other developed nations are either higher or compable to the US. Things must be really, really bad in Belgium, Finland and Iceland eh (you know, just three of the nicest countries on Earth). How could Sweden, France and Australia be anywhere near the US rate?

Suicide rates in order per 100k: South Korea 20.2, Belgium 15.7, Japan 14.3, Finland 13.8, US 13.3, Iceland 13.3, France 12.1, Sweden 11.7, Australia 11.7, New Zealand 11.6, Switzerland 11.3, Ireland 10.9, Canada 10.4, Norway 10.1

Others in Europe: Russia 26, Lithuania 25.7, Belarus 21.4, Ukraine 18.5, Latvia 17.2, Estonia 14.4, Hungary 13.6, Moldova 13.4, Poland 13.4, Slovenia 13.3, Austria 11.4

Why are Europeans killing themselves at such high rates?

<comment><USER13> I think it is rate of change which has people concerned. The rate of suicide in the US is up 25% in the last 15 years.

<comment><USER14> > The US is pretty much also the only country where suicides are increasing

So the initial assertion was not compelling.

> it is rate of change which has people concerned.

Do you have any source about people being concerned (what people?) for the new goalpost?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The opioid epidemic is an amazing example of human psychology and the power of a visual. More people die from it every year than Vietnam, yet there's been no large public outcry to resolve the situation because it isn't right in your face like a 9/11 or pearl harbor. Even ignoring the human impact and just going to economics, those lost lives will cost the US billions in lost productivity over time, yet nobody really cares.

Honestly, somebody should make a Kony2012 style video about it. It was a sham but I can still remember how viral that thing went, because it hit all the buttons of human psychology.

<comment><USER16> _More people die from it every year than Vietnam_

[Kind of off-topic] I'm guessing you mean by 'than Vietnam', 'than Americans died in the Vietnam war"? (Well I think so. Apologies if not.) That's a pretty macabre unit. Can you imagine how a Vietnamese person would feel reading that? Maybe in Vietnam they say 'More people die from [something] every year than America' \- meaning what they call the American War[0]. Wouldn't that sound super-weird. That's something like how what you said sounds to me. Only for them it would mean 1-3 million.

[0] or the Resistance War Against America.

edit: Downvoter, care to explain how I can improve my comment? Thanks.

<comment><USER17> You're being pedantic for the sake of outrage.

<comment><USER18> >You're being pedantic for the sake of outrage.

Eh no.

Imagine you're sitting in Canada and say "The opiod epidemic kills more people annually than WW II", and then when confronted, you say "Of _course_ I mean Canadian lives in WW II!"

Americans may only see 55000 deaths in Vietnam. The rest of the world (and HN is international in audience) sees a lot more.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Drug overdose and abuse seem to me to be a symptom of something way more troubling. I can't help but feel like there is a sense of uselessness felt by and toward a large population in the US and rather than lift them up we are letting them be snuffed out.

<comment><USER20> > Drug overdose and abuse seem to me to be a symptom of something way more > troubling.

A general feeling of disconnectedness? Perhaps some existential dread in there. The United States (by and large) used to be lashed to religious moorings, which provided some sense of purpose and moral grounding, as well as fending off pesky questions like "what happens to me when I die?"

The statistics that claim the US is still largely religious are hallow. People wear labels of their religion as a means to exclude or silently signal 'better-than-you', when the purpose and message of those religions has nothing to do with that.

I don't mean to say lack of religion is the primary cause of our opioid epidemic, rather a significant contributing factor.

I would venture a guess that things like easy access and over-prescription also play a role.

<comment><USER21> I'm honestly shocked how American doctors seem to give out opioid prescriptions for any illness or pain. I've not once heard from somebody here (Germany) that was prescribed opioids by their dentist after a surgery. They usually tell you to take some tylenol and rest at home, I've never heard of somebody getting opioid for that. But I've heard it mentioned multiple times regarding american dentists.

There surely are more examples where the docs seem to be a lot less careful about giving out these drugs. Also I think, and that's not only regarding the US, but all of the world, people should be getting way more education about what these drugs are, what they cause, how they should be taken and how you should stop taking them / what risks it bears if you don't.

<comment><USER22> > People should be getting way more education about what these drugs are, what > they cause, how they should be taken and how you should stop taking them / > what risks it bears if you don't.

My experience is that it's too complicated for people. My parents can just about understand don't take more than 8 paracetamol/tylenol per day, or don't take advil if you've got high blood pressure, but any more complex than that and they just can't really understand it.

They can't (or don't want to) understand that certain antibiotics mix poorly with alcohol (Don't drink on antibioitics) or that some painkillers are _not_ suitable for hangovers (headache == tylenol). They don't understand how statistics of side effects work (10% of people have one or more of the following side effects means "It won't happen to me"), or that some supplements can interfere with medication (warfarin and St Johns wort), and that this is bad, even though they're not medicines.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Note that if you are in the demographic of well educated and high income Americans, your life expectancy is still quite high and you should assume you will live to your 90s when planning for retirement!

The decrease in life expectancy observed is being largely driven by people on the middle to lower portion of the income spectrum. It's very unfortunate that it is happening and so many people are struggling. Hopefully our country can come up with solutions to help out people who are struggling with addiction and poor health.

But, it's important to remember that if you are not in that demographic, you are still likely to live a very long life and need to plan for that.

<comment><USER24> The article is about the trend - not the absolute numbers

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> A lot of premature deaths are not just a direct result of suicide or drug abuse, but a deeper result of despair and isolation. Improved healthcare would help, but I feel like it's a cultural issue as well.

My grandfather died in his early 70's a few years ago. By any other measure, he should have lived well into his 80's. He had a comfortable middle-class life and was quite healthy when he was younger. But he spent the last decades of his life in rural Maryland with very little social contact. My family rarely visited him. For reasons I'm still unsure, my dad didn't talk to him for almost 2 decades. His physical and mental health really disintegrated.

My wife is from India, and I'm convinced that this sort of thing is more rare there. There is a strong, almost sacred connection between family members. If your parent is sick or unwell, you bring them into your house and take care of them. No questions asked. For the most part, the culture in (white, middle- class) America looks at things very differently, and I'm not really sure what the solution could be.

</comment><comment><USER26> And subtract 5.5 for Native Americans [https://www.ihs.gov/newsroom/factsheets/disparities/](https://www.ihs.gov/newsroom/factsheets/disparities/)

Native Americans on reservations have free health care from IHS [https://www.ihs.gov/](https://www.ihs.gov/) [https://www.ihs.gov/forpatients/faq/](https://www.ihs.gov/forpatients/faq/)

</comment><comment><USER27> This seems like a case of temporary circumstances and statistical creating a doomsday picture. The temporary circumstances seem to be the suicide rate brought on by the still recovering economy and glib life prospects. Partly related to this is a new deadly drug that is gaining popularity.

Add to this the statistical factors like the anti smoking and healthy living campaigns hitting their peak effect a few decades after improvents in modern science hit their peak effectiveness.

To me, it seems like life exectancy will improve again as the economy improves and governments find ways to fight fentynal.

Improving life expectancy maked great advancements in healthcare and sanitaion and lifestyle in the past. As these improvements seem to have peaked I dont know that life expectany is still a good indicator of progress in rich nations

<comment><USER28> > To me, it seems like life exectancy will improve again as the economy > improves and governments find ways to fight fentynal.

I find this exceedingly difficult to believe in the rural areas of the US. The current expansion is almost the longest on record, going on since 2009. The structural forces that have hollowed out the economies of rural areas (widening inequality, e-commerce, globalization, etc.) are only increasing, not decreasing. The drug overdoses may be caused by powerful opiates like fentanyl, but the drug _use_ is mainly a symptom, not cause, of despair.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> It's remarkable how much of the article narrates a tale of opioids and suicide, whereas the obvious elephant in the room seems the be the poor, or lack thereof of a public health care system.

<comment><USER27> I dont disagree that public healthcare would improve life expectancy but it wouldn't cause a decrease in life expectancy as healthcare is not any less accessible today than in the past

<comment><USER29> Citation needed, if only because of the increased expense.

Also, public heath care plays a massive role in opioids treatment and suicide prevention, at least in developed countries.

What seems to be clear is, unless the issue if acknowledged, the US will continue to slide literally to developing countries life expectancy levels.

<comment><USER30> I wonder if I should be concerned. If I simply avoid opioids and suicide, I'm safe?

<comment><USER29> It depends. Do you attend a high school in America?

<comment><USER31> Is this a reference to shooting deaths? If so, you should be aware that there are ~100 mass shooting deaths a year despite the sensational coverage they get in the media. America does have many more gun deaths than other countries, but the majority of those deaths are suicides and a majority of the homicides are in high crime areas. This is a problem that we can address, but mass shootings, though tragic and terrifying, are not a large public health issue.

<comment><USER29> The intentional murder rate in the US is around an order of magnitude bigger than in most countries in Western Europe, Australia or Canada. If you think that's not an issue, I guess I must disagree.

<comment><USER31> I do think that's an issue, and I said it's one we can address. It's separate from the issue of mass shootings in schools, which is what I was commenting about.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Can someone explain the link of the lowered life expectancy to flu and pneumonia? I thought that these were deceases that were only fatal for people with compromised immunity.

<comment><USER30> Wow, maybe (not being sarcastic) eating a monocultured food diet and living as sedate humans in sterile environments has a bigger effect on our immune systems than we'd like. This must have been measured? Compare immunity in farmers vs office workers or some such?

<comment><USER33> I think you underestimate the amount of bad health environments there are in cities (anecdotal evidence only). I would not call most cities or working environments anywhere close to sterile.

<comment><USER34> To be honest, nobody is talking about very deadly exposure to pesticides in farmers populations. There actually have been papers published on that. While living outside a big city might be on average better for you, being a farmer is probably not.

<comment><USER30> Right; nobody was talking about that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> I've been re-reading the foundation series by Asimov lately. Without spoiling the plot, one common theme in the book is the decline of empire. It's uncomforably germane.

</comment><comment><USER36> I would like to see this correlated to access to "health care", which need not necessarily translate to improved health.

From personal experience, I have a strong suspicion that much of this "care" is actually harming people. In particular I am concerned about over- prescription of anti-pain/anxiety/depressant medications and incorrect dietary modifications (eg, to eat a low-fat/salt/cholesterol diet).

EDIT:

Very roughly, there is a link to "obamacare". From TFA:

> _" The U.S. has lost three-tenths of a year in life expectancy since 2014, a > stunning reversal for a developed nation, and lags far behind other wealthy > nations."_

> _" The ACA's major provisions came into force in 2014. By 2016, the > uninsured share of the population had roughly halved, with estimates ranging > from 20 to 24 million additional people covered during 2016."_ > [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patient_Protection_and_Afforda...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patient_Protection_and_Affordable_Care_Act)

<comment><USER37> The psychiatrist David Healy wrote an awesome, but poorly titled book called Pharmageddon just on this point. By some estimates up to 500K people a year are killed due to bad interaction with the medical system. Per a Johns Hopkins report they estimate around 180K. Its worth noting this is not just medical errors which are incredibly frequent, but much of it is due to side effects of correctly prescribed drugs.

<comment><USER36> Thanks, not sure if I would read an entire book on it though. What source of data does he use?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> (On edit: below comment is retracted. At least for 2015 to 2016, the decline is not attributable to Simpson's paradox. See Table 4 in the CDC report linked below.)

This is either incompetence or maliciousness on behalf of the CDC, WSJ, or both. Life expectancy in the US is falling, but it's only falling due to Simpson's Paradox [1].

The CDC's own data [2] shows life expectancy increasing for all genders and races except black men, which decreased marginally over the last few years.

The primary reason life expectancy is falling is due to changes in the racial composition of the population, not because of opioids or suicide.

[1]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simpson%27s_paradox](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simpson%27s_paradox)

[2]: [https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr67/nvsr67_05.pdf](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr67/nvsr67_05.pdf) (see Figure 5)

<comment><USER39> From the document you posted:

since 1990. • In 2016 compared with 2015, life expectancy decreased for non- Hispanic white males (0.2 year), non-Hispanic black males (0.4), non-Hispanic black females (0.2), Hispanic males (0.2), and Hispanic females (0.1). Life expectancy for non-Hispanic white females remained unchanged

So, no, it's not just Simpson's paradox.

<comment><USER38> You're correct. I edited the parent.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> "Life expectancy for Americans fell again last year, despite growing recognition of the problems driving the decline and federal and local funds invested in stemming them."

If lack of awareness isn't the problem, then what is? What drives people to end their lives? Is it the way we live our lives? The people around us and our inner demons telling us it's the only way to stop the pain? And would projects involving life extension work and make them not go through their plan of taking their own lives?

</comment><comment><USER41> Measuring life expectancy from birth is more a measure of infant mortality.

The data on life expectancy from 5 years old is remarkably consistent... mid to upper 70's.

It's even more consistent when one looks at life expectancy from 21 years.

I do not have links to the charts showing this. But, last time I checked, I was quite surprised at how a sensational story about life-expectancy from birth loses much of its significance when one disregards the deaths that occur in the first 5 years of life.

</comment><comment><USER42> My little brother killed himself last month.

My cousin OD'ed on heroin in 2016. My old classmate, 2 weeks after him - <USER2> church for the funeral.

One of my best friends killed himself in 2015.

<comment><USER43> I am so very sorry for your losses.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> As with many problems in the U.S., income and wealth inequality are largely to blame: [https://www.vox.com/science-and- health/2018/1/9/16860994/lif...](https://www.vox.com/science-and- health/2018/1/9/16860994/life-expectancy-us-income-inequality)

</comment><comment><USER45> Stress, cancer, inactivity, obesity, diabetes, prescription and street drug abuse... doesn't surprise me unfortunately :(

<comment><USER46> Nicotine, Valium, Vicodin, Marijuana, Ecstasy, and Alcohol ....C-c-c-cocaine

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAXPUN2z2CE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAXPUN2z2CE)

</comment></comment><comment><USER47> Visit the rural parts of the US and you'll see that see-destructive behaviors are way too common. There's no hope right now for half the country. Whatever wealth they had has been mined out.

</comment><comment><USER48> I think we've reached the point of diminishing marginal returns to health care spending. That means when we spend more money on healthcare as a percent of GDP, life expectancy starts to fall. We are already at 16% of GDP spent on healthcare. That's double the amount that any other country spends on healthcare. We also have worse life expectancy vs. countries that spend much less as a percent of GDP than we do.

One of the most disturbing trends in American healthcare, IMHO, is that the suicide rate has been steadily rising since 2000. It's now back to where it was in the 1980s before SSRIs.

<comment><USER49> US healthcare outcomes in most areas aren't actually particularly good, though (iirc, it does reasonably well on cancer, but is under par on most other stuff). The US healthcare system is expensive because it's inefficient.

<comment><USER50> I would argue that it's expensive because it is private and unregulated.

The amount of anger the healthcare system can cause in the US is unbelievable. Example, I had a surgery that was pre-approved. Then, I received a bill for $20k. I called the insurance and they said the company wanted to charge them to much and they could not come to an agreement, therefore, they are not paying. So, I call the surgery place and told them there is no way I am paying that bill.

I kept getting bills for 4-5 years, till they settled with insurance company and send me a bill for $500. At that point, I decided just not to pay it, because it angered me so much.

Doctors are under pressure now too. There is pressure to see many patients in a day. Push drugs, vaccinations and so on. It is terrible for everyone involved except companies who benefit financially from it.

<comment><USER49> > I would argue that it's expensive because it is private and unregulated.

Oh, sure, that's likely what makes it inefficient.

<comment><USER51> Empirically, the US health care market is both the most privatized and the most inefficient.

[http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra- klein/2010/01/america_...](http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra- klein/2010/01/america_spends_way_way_way_mor.html)

[https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-08/cu- ups080211...](https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-08/cu- ups080211.php)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> You want a clear sign that the U.S. is failing? Here's one.

It's the short, statistical version of a thousand thousand tragic individual tales.

</comment><comment><USER53> How is the obesity epidemic not affecting deaths?

I remember clearly nurses saying hospitals are full of elderly and obese people.

</comment><comment><USER54> Is there any indication as to whether life expectancy has fallen for all income groups? Are there any income related discrepancies?

<comment><USER55> Rich people's life expectancy is increasing just fine, it's the poorer people that are having trouble.

Source: [https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article- abstract/25135...](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article- abstract/2513561?utm_campaign=articlePDF%26utm_medium%3darticlePDFlink%26utm_source%3darticlePDF%26utm_content%3djama.2018.2521)

</comment></comment><comment><USER56> Article:

Life expectancy for Americans fell again last year, despite growing recognition of the problems driving the decline and federal and local funds invested in stemming them.

Data the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released on Thursday show life expectancy fell by one-tenth of a year, to 78.6 years, pushed down by the sharpest annual increase in suicides in nearly a decade and a continued rise in deaths from powerful opioid drugs like fentanyl. Influenza, pneumonia and diabetes also factored into last year's increase.

Economists and public-health experts consider life expectancy to be an important measure of a nation's prosperity. The 2017 data paint a dark picture of health and well-being in the U.S., reflecting the effects of addiction and despair, particularly among young and middle-aged adults, as well as diseases plaguing an aging population and people with lower access to health care.

"The continuation of this trend is a warning for all of us that our country has not found a way of addressing the profound needs of the people who are dying," said Eric Caine, professor of psychiatry and director of the Injury Control Research Center for Suicide Prevention at the University of Rochester Medical Center. "While the economy may be recovering at the macro level, it's very uncertain whether it's affecting the lives of these people."

The U.S. has lost three-tenths of a year in life expectancy since 2014, a stunning reversal for a developed nation, and lags far behind other wealthy nations.

Life expectancy is 84.1 years in Japan and 83.7 years in Switzerland, first and second in the most-recent ranking by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. The U.S. ranks 29th.

"It's significant," Bob Anderson, chief of the mortality-statistics branch of the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics, said in an interview. "It doesn't seem like a lot, but in terms of human cost you've got a lot of life that's not being lived."

White men and women fared the worst, along with black men, all of whom experienced increases in death rates. Death rates rose in particular for adults ages 25 to 44, and suicide rates are highest among people in the nation's most rural areas. On the other hand, deaths declined for black and Hispanic women, and remained the same for Hispanic men.

"These sobering statistics are a wakeup call that we are losing too many Americans, too early and too often, to conditions that are preventable," said CDC Director Robert Redfield.

As drug and suicide mortality has risen, deaths from heart disease, the nation's leading killer, went down only slightly, failing to offset the increases in mortality from other causes and prolonging another worrisome trend. A decadeslong decline in deaths from heart disease—brought about by antismoking and other public-health campaigns, along with medications to control blood pressure and cholesterol—has stalled in recent years, with heart-disease deaths even increasing slightly in 2015.

Earlier this century, the steady and robust decline in heart-disease deaths more than offset the rising number from drugs and suicide, Dr. Anderson said. Now, "those declines aren't there anymore," he said, and the drug and suicide deaths account for many years of life lost because they occur mostly in young to middle-aged adults.

While progress against deaths from heart disease has stalled, cancer deaths—the nation's No. 2 killer—are continuing a steady decline that began in the 1990s, Dr. Anderson said. "That's kind of our saving grace," he said. "Without those declines, we'd see a much bigger drop in life expectancy."

Drug-overdose deaths skyrocketed between 2015 and 2017, particularly for adults between ages 25 and 54. The main culprit was fentanyl and other synthetic opioids that became pervasive in illicit drug supplies in the U.S. around that time.

Deaths from synthetic opioids rose 45% in 2017, while the death rate from heroin, which had risen sharply after 2010, was flat.

Methamphetamine and cocaine use is on the rise in the U.S., but deaths from those drugs weren't broken out from the total. Those statistics will be released in mid-December, in a separate report, said Holly Hedegaard, a medical epidemiologist at the CDC and lead author of the reports released Thursday on drug overdoses and suicide.

There is some hope the decline in life expectancy won't be prolonged. The rise in drug-overdose deaths was slower in 2017 than the previous year. Total overdose deaths for the preceding 12 months dropped slightly between late last year and April, though they remain high.

"We may have reached a peak in regards to the drug-overdose epidemic," Dr. Anderson said. "I'm hopeful, given what we've seen in recent months." But, he cautioned, "This might just be a lull."

More federal and local resources have been devoted to the opioid crisis. States began accessing nearly $1 billion in federal grants in 2017 to combat the opioid crisis. In addition, opioid prescriptions are monitored more tightly, and medication to reverse opioid overdoses has become more available, among other factors possibly behind the tentative improvement.

Suicides rose 3.7% in 2017, accelerating an increase in rates since 1999, the CDC said. The gap in deaths by suicide widened starkly between cities and the most rural areas between 1999 and 2017, the data show. The rate is now far higher in rural areas. "There's a much wider spread," Dr. Hedegaard said.

"This is extremely discouraging," Christine Moutier, chief medical officer of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, said of the suicide-rate increase. Studies show that traumas such as economic difficulties or natural disasters, along with access to lethal means including guns and opioid drugs, and lack of access to care can affect suicide rates, she said. More accurate recording of deaths may also have added to the numbers, she said.

Scientific understanding of suicide and its risk factors is improving, Dr. Moutier said, and new prevention programs are being implemented. But their effects have yet to be felt, because they haven't been scaled up yet, she said.

"The science is growing tremendously," she said. "We now have answers about how to prevent suicide."

</comment><comment><USER57> USA #1! You can't kill yourself as good as we can!

</comment><comment><USER36> What do they mean by overdose?

The WSJ did not seem to properly cite its sources here, but I am guessing it is this:

>"Drug overdose deaths are identified using underlying cause-of-death codes from the Tenth Revision of ICD (ICD–10): X40–X44 (unintentional), X60–X64 (suicide), X85 (homicide), and Y10–Y14 (undetermined)." [https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/drug-overdose- data.htm#no...](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/drug-overdose- data.htm#notes)

      Accidental poisoning by and exposure to nonopioid analgesics, antipyretics and antirheumatics
      Accidental poisoning by and exposure to nonopioid analgesics, antipyretics and antirheumatics
      Accidental poisoning by and exposure to narcotics and psychodysleptics [hallucinogens], not elsewhere classified
      Accidental poisoning by and exposure to other drugs acting on the autonomic nervous system
      Accidental poisoning by and exposure to other and unspecified drugs, medicaments and biological substances

[http://apps.who.int/classifications/apps/icd/icd10online2004...](http://apps.who.int/classifications/apps/icd/icd10online2004/fr- icd.htm?gx40.htm+)

      Intentional self-poisoning by and exposure to nonopioid analgesics, antipyretics and antirheumatics
      Intentional self-poisoning by and exposure to antiepileptic, sedative-hypnotic, antiparkinsonism and psychotropic drugs, not elsewhere classified
      Intentional self-poisoning by and exposure to narcotics and psychodysleptics [hallucinogens], not elsewhere classified
      Intentional self-poisoning by and exposure to other drugs acting on the autonomic nervous system
      Intentional self-poisoning by and exposure to other and unspecified drugs, medicaments and biological substances

[http://apps.who.int/classifications/apps/icd/icd10online2003...](http://apps.who.int/classifications/apps/icd/icd10online2003/fr- icd.htm?gx60.htm+)

      Assault by drugs, medicaments and biological substances

[http://apps.who.int/classifications/apps/icd/icd10online2005...](http://apps.who.int/classifications/apps/icd/icd10online2005/fr- icd.htm?gx85.htm+)

      Poisoning by and exposure to nonopioid analgesics, antipyretics and antirheumatics, undetermined intent
      Poisoning by and exposure to nonopioid analgesics, antipyretics and antirheumatics, undetermined intent
      Poisoning by and exposure to narcotics and psychodysleptics [hallucinogens], not elsewhere classified, undetermined intent
      Poisoning by and exposure to other drugs acting on the autonomic nervous system, undetermined intent
      Poisoning by and exposure to other and unspecified drugs, medicaments and biological substances, undetermined intent

[http://apps.who.int/classifications/apps/icd/icd10online2004...](http://apps.who.int/classifications/apps/icd/icd10online2004/fr- icd.htm?gy10.htm+)

Overdosing on opiods is only one part of this category. Basically if you take too little/much of a medication (eg, blood pressure medication) you would be counted here. So I wonder if this increase is not just reflecting a general increase in taking medications.

</comment><comment><USER58> The world definitevely needs to move past GDP as key metric to evaluate success of a nation.

<comment><USER59> What does this contribute exactly to conversation about this topic? Most people when evaluating success of a country take into account a slurry of values such as GDP, Life Expectancy, GDP Per Capita (more important than GDP IMO), Unemployment, Fertility, Education, Income Inequality. Take a look at the OECD data sheet for the United States: [https://data.oecd.org/united- states.htm](https://data.oecd.org/united-states.htm).

Comments like this just scream America hating and serve to inflame, they don't contribute to a substantive conversation.

<comment><USER58> It is not America hating, as this is not just an issue for US. Sorry if it sounded that way.

You are right in that there are more indicators already defined, but you don't see presidents boasting these figures - and even press and newspapers focus way more on economy and GDP. It's simply more important in most heads, in my opinion, and this whould change (again my opinion!)</comment></comment></comment>


Why multivariate owns A/B testing . . .  - <AUTHOR> http://www.conversionvoodoo.com/blog/what-is-ab-and-multivariable-testing/

<comment><USER2> > After we get enough traffic to run through our test

And therein lies the trick.

Google and Facebook can do multivariate testing easily because they get 100k pageviews without blinking an eye.

You probably cannot.

In fact, the more variables you start to simultaneously manipulate, the more likely it is to guarantee that you will not attain statistical significance for any decision (i.e. your study will be underpowered).</comment>


Google unveils free wireless service to homes: Google TISP - <AUTHOR> http://www.google.com/tisp/

<comment><USER2> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google%27s_hoaxes#Google_TiSP>

It's not quite April 1st again, is it?

:p

</comment><comment><USER3> You're only 3 years behind on this one. <http://www.google.com/tisp/press.html>

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Ha Ha! Rofl! :-)</comment>


Face recognition, bad people and bad data - <AUTHOR> https://www.ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2019/9/6/face-recognition <comment><USER2> Clean data is essential to good results in AI and machine learning, but data can become biased and less accurate at multiple stages in its lifetime—from moment it is generated all the way through to when it is processed—and it can happen in ways that are not always obvious and often difficult to discern [https://semiengineering.com/where-data-gets- biased/](https://semiengineering.com/where-data-gets-biased/)

<comment><USER3> > Clean data is essential to good results in AI

Your not wrong, but I think this is worth taking a second to clarify.

See, when I think of "clean" data, I think of a set of crisp, noiseless images, or text without typos, or DNA sequences w/o sequencing errors or low- quality reads.

For AI purposes, you want a set of representative noise... w/o it, you'll be building a very brittle model. The key is, as you've mentioned, to assure that the method of data collection/generation/processing is either (1) unbiased throughout or (2) is done using various methods ideally performed by different entities.

So, there is certainly a distinction between bias and noise (the opposite of which I would probably call "cleanliness").

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Corporations are slowly integrating this technology and sell these off as features on newer generation phones like face recognition or finger print unlocking without the average Joe not knowing the potential threat it might pose.

</comment><comment><USER5> When the right to be forgotten becomes plastic surgery.

<comment><USER6> I don't see why this was downvoted. We really are heading towards exactly such a future, in which the only psuedo-chance of recapturing privacy will be through surgeries that modify biometric indicators.</comment></comment>


The Intersection Observer API - <AUTHOR> https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Intersection_Observer_API <comment><AUTHOR> This came up in another front-page article today (the Pornhub developer one) and it's an API that I had never heard about before.</comment>


Show HN: Everybithelps(hackathon project) – In browser mining for charity widget - <AUTHOR> https://everybithelps.co <comment><AUTHOR> I made this for the producthunt hackathon because I thought it's an interesting concept. I see a lot of positives to letting people donate to charities through in browser mining, but also a lot of negatives.

Positives 1\. I believe that a big reason people don't donate more often is because they can't be bothered. By letting them donate without having to fill out any forms etc. you are reducing the friction which I believe would make it easier for charities to raise money. 2\. If the result of this is users keeping a tab of the hosting website open longer it would be a pretty big win for the hosting website as well.

Negatives 1\. We are basically asking people to donate their power supply. It would be much more efficient for them to donate directly. 2\. It's another website widget...

On the technical side - the backend is written in Elixir, the widget is written in React and the admin dashboard is using Phoenix templates.

</comment><comment><USER2> I like the idea, but I really wish that the mining process itself would produce something useful.

We should really be folding proteins, solving mathematical problems, or simulating complex systems like the atmosphere. Not calculating hashes.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the feedback! I actually completely agree with what you are saying, and I wouldn't rule out using the same type of concept to do something just like that. The only problem I see is you'll still need to find a way to pay for the servers that are serving the end users "jobs". If that could be solved it would be a great thing to do!</comment></comment>


Ask HN: What's up with Silicon Valley Bank? - <AUTHOR>

I've noticed a bunch of startups using SVB, I love the obvious connotations and prestige implied by the name, and was curious about what kinds of accounts they offer. Unfortunately their website is utterly cluttered, has huge ugly Flash banners, no obvious way to open an account or see account types, and the whole thing looks like a WordPress blog full of cliche stock imagery. What's up with these guys? Do they open business accounts for small startups with angel funding and small teams? Is it worth the time to drop into a branch and discuss switching over from Wells Fargo, Chase or other run of the mill bank? Any benefits (beyond the cool name on your checks)? <comment><USER2> They don't have a pretty website because they don't need one. Most Silicon Valley startups work with them by default.

In addition to regular banking services, they provide networking events for clients and are more startup-savvy than your typical bank. My experience with them is minimal, so perhaps somebody that's worked with them more extensively can provide more depth.</comment>


We Know Exactly Who Strong Arms a Free Press - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@davepell/we-know-exactly-who-strong-arms-the-free-press-1c8d1d4bbe39 <comment><USER2> TL;DR: Trump == Hitler.

Edit: don't downvote, _debate_. How is this article not a dog-whistle about Trump being a democracy-destroying authoritarian?</comment>


Making Knuth's wish come true: the x32 ABI - <AUTHOR> http://blog.reverberate.org/2011/09/26/making-knuths-wish-come-true-the-x32-abi/ <comment><USER2> This looks like a very cool project. As long as I've had a 64-bit x64 processor you've been able to use _gcc -m32_ , but that just uses 32-bit compatibility mode (meaning you can't use the extra r __registers or any 64-bit instructions). A 32-bit ABI that runs with 64-bit registers and instructions would be great.

I just hope it's all automatic; I started programming in C just as 32-bit DOS compilers became widespread, so I never had to distinguish between near/far pointers, small/big memory models, etc. I'd like to keep it that way.</comment>


Show HN: selected.js, a dependency free  replacement - <AUTHOR> http://pointlessramblings.com/posts/selectedjs/ <comment><USER2> Very very nice.</comment>


Pulse teams up with Posterous for Social Sharing - <AUTHOR> http://mashable.com/2010/08/02/pulse-posterous/

<comment><USER2> So, the service appears to let you read content from many sources, select that which piques your interest and publish it to a reverse-chronologically ordered web page.

In my day, we called that blogging.</comment>


Ask HN: Is it necessary to backup S3? - <AUTHOR> I have a consumer Saas Web Application that uses S3 to store user's documents. Do you think it's necessary to backup the S3 data to Rackspace Cloud? <comment><USER2> At the end of the day it's an economics question. How much might you lose in a worst case scenario if you failed to recover some vital data? How much extra will it cost to back up your data to a second place? If the answers to those questions are "everything" and "not a lot" then there is no reason not to backup your backups.

As a general rule important data should be backed up to (at least) two separate places, and in this scenario I'd consider S3 to be one place.

<comment><USER3> AND PRACTICE YOUR RESTORES!

<comment><USER4> That can not be said often enough. We should make a list of IT disaster stories from people that did not take that piece of advice to heart.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> If you are hacked, someone could get your S3 credentials and delete your content. You should backup.

<comment><USER6> It would be wonderful if S3 offered a write-only, no-overwrite mode so you could upload stuff from servers without storing credentials.

<comment><USER7> You can actually kind of do that. There's a system intended to allow random users credential-free upload access to your buckets via POST, but you can enforce policy control like "the target has to have xyz/ as a prefix" and "the size must be fewer than 100000 bytes". Here are the S3 docs for it: [http://docs.amazonwebservices.com/AmazonS3/2006-03-01/index....](http://docs.amazonwebservices.com/AmazonS3/2006-03-01/index.html?UsingHTTPPOST.html)

<comment><USER7> On second glance, it doesn't support "no overwrite".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> It's necessary, because you never know when you'll accidentally corrupt all your data. Even if Amazon never fails, your application still can.

</comment><comment><USER9> You can put all the marketing spin on it that you want, but S3 is still just another webapp. Architected by humans, operated by humans.

If you think the humans at Amazon are somehow above making mistakes or bad decisions, then there is no need to backup your data.

If you don't fully trust the humans at Amazon, and what to be able to have access to your data, on your terms, at any time, you should back it up...

</comment><comment><USER4> How would you feel if one day that data was lost ?

There are already documented cases of Amazon losing data in S3.

The Amazon S3 SLA does not cover data loss at all, only service unavailable situations, which they will cover by crediting you.

<http://aws.amazon.com/s3-sla/>

[http://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2007/10/09/amazo...](http://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2007/10/09/amazon- offers-sla-for-s3-storage/)

And even if all this was not the case you have a responsibility to your customers you can not outsource that responsibility.

<comment><USER10> I have never seen a documented case of S3 losing data. Please provide references.

I have recommended to some customers that they back up S3 data to the S3 service running in another region. The new export service also provides a way to get physical copies of your data but, depending on how much data you have, it might not be practical.

<comment><USER4> [http://developer.amazonwebservices.com/connect/thread.jspa?t...](http://developer.amazonwebservices.com/connect/thread.jspa?threadID=17246&tstart=0)

[http://developer.amazonwebservices.com/connect/thread.jspa?t...](http://developer.amazonwebservices.com/connect/thread.jspa?threadID=22709)

Do you need more or do you think that is enough like that ?

We've been here before by the way:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=528541>

<comment><USER11> Come on...one of these is from 06, and it looks like it was totally dealt w/ by Amazon customer service, and the other one was from 07 and is a complaint about EC2 when it was still in beta.

Would love to see REAL documented cases of data loss on Amazon, and anything in the last year would be great too.

Not saying it's infallible, and you should always back up your data (Amazon can't prevent things like natural disasters - this is the point of backing up in general - you can't predict), but if you're going to act like you gave good examples, at least give good examples.

<comment><USER4> Look, all I'm saying is it happened before, Amazon makes absolutely no guarantees and it could very well happen again.

To categorically deny this because you think the cases are not 'good enough' is arguing that only when there is specific documentation about S3 losing data in the last couple of months or a year will convince you that Amazon S3 can indeed lose data. Even if Amazon S3 had never lost data before then there still would be no reason to assume that it could not happen.

S3 is made up from hardware and built by people. It can - and most likely will - fail again, it has already done so in the past. When the last case was is not really relevant, just like when the last earthquake was is not really relevant when you're living on a fault line.

Earthquakes - and data loss - are a fact of life in the IT business, you plan for them, or you weigh the economics of the risk and you decide that you can re-create your data at a lower cost than it will cost you to back it up over the average time to failure.

Amazon will not be able to magically recreate your data so if you have a business incentive to keep your data (such as a responsibility to third parties) then you should back it up.

It's that simple.

Oh, and regarding amazon customer service, note that it took them 11 days to pinpoint the fault, and customer data actually was lost.

Check Allans post at Jun 23, 2008 6:28 AM for a pretty good insight into how easy it is for S3 to break.

What also bothers me is that apparently all traffic for these customers was passing the same SPOF, a single load balancer.

Another thing to take home from this is to ALWAYS supply an MD5 of your data and keep an MD5 of what you sent.

Gmail, another example of a large body of data that end users have some attachement to has also occasionally lost data, see:

<http://www.thebitguru.com/blog/view/252-Have> you lost email on gmail

Sure, you could argue, gmail is not S3, but that is not relevant, the things they have in common (type of architecture, kind of hardware, run by very fallible people) are what matter.

<comment><USER11> As I said:

Not saying it's infallible, and you should always back up your data (Amazon can't prevent things like natural disasters - this is the point of backing up in general - you can't predict), but if you're going to act like you gave good examples, at least give good examples.

If that's what you call categorically denying that it can happen....

Again, please find a case in the last 2 years even.

I think we both agree you should back up your data, and as an IT policy it's obviously incorrect to ever think you're 100% safe, and if you use S3 you should still be redundant if you want to get closer to that 99.9% limit. But you'll never be 100% - that's life.

The only reason I defend S3 so heavily is that compared to the other options you'd be using instead of (or better: in concurrence with) S3, it's probably among the safest, data loss wise.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Yes, Sometimes the software tools you use can mess up. I lost many production EC2 images because of this unfixed bug in elasticfox:

[http://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid...](http://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid=2835716&group_id=212540&atid=1022151)

(basically if you have similarly named images, they'll all get deleted with the "Delete AMI parts and deregister" feature)

</comment><comment><USER13> keep multiple snapshots so that you can recover files after you delete them yourself.

#!/bin/sh

AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=<>

AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=<>

BUCKET=<>

DIR=<>

S3SYNC=/usr/bin/s3sync.rb

DAYS_TO_KEEP_BACKUPS=30

# colons in path confuse s3sync

DATE=$(date +%F_%H-%M-%S)

NEWEST=$(/bin/ls -r $DIR | grep -v current | head -1)

# copy the newest copy of files into a new directory, creating hardlinks instead of duplicate files

cp -al $DIR/$NEWEST/ $DIR/$DATE/

# sync the s3 bucket against the new directory

$S3SYNC --recursive --make-dirs --delete --no-md5 -v $BUCKET: $DIR/$DATE/ 2>&1 | grep -v 'Could not change owner'

# update the "current" symlink link

test -e $DIR/current && rm $DIR/current

ln -sf $DIR/$DATE $DIR/current

# remove snapshots older than DAYS_TO_KEEP_BACKUPS days

find $DIR -maxdepth 1 -type d -mtime +$DAYS_TO_KEEP_BACKUPS -print0 | xargs -0 --no-run-if-empty rm -rv

</comment><comment><USER14> Sofar I have never heard about S3 actually losing data (apart from users erasing it). They store everything 3 times. But I would have a look at the cost/MB. Documents are usually small and important (thus, worth to backup). I have read that SmugMug, for example, stores it's files just on S3, with no backup.

<comment><USER15> _apart from users erasing it_

Very _very_ important caveat, there. If you have three copies of the data, but all of them are in the same S3 account, a prankster who steals your S3 creds can delete all of them in about ten seconds.

Or, if you make a typing mistake, you can do that to yourself. Boy oh boy, will that be an unhappy day.

Diversify, diversify, diversify.

<comment><USER16> Very true. One instance I can think of is using the firefox addon S3Fox for managing S3. My co-worker came close to deleting a prod bucket with 80K+ images.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> You should certainly backup your data. While the engineers at Amazon are certainly among the smartest, they are not infallible. Things do fail from time to time.

I lost 1TB of data several months ago due to some backend issues with EBS and S3. Fortunately for me, it was just a backup of a backup of a backup. ;-)

<comment><USER17> It's also worth pointing out that this might have been more of a failure of EBS (elastic block storage, an abstraction over S3) than with native S3 buckets.

Ultimately, my EBS device become unusable by any operating system, and Amazon support stated that the data was lost due to several backend systems failing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> At $0.15/GB it's a no-brainer for the piece of mind. I once heard of a case (not with Amazon) where data was replicated in 3 locations, and data got corrupted in one location and was copied to the others, resulting in corrupted data in all 3.

</comment><comment><USER19> Standard response from anyone: Backup everything, _just in case_

<http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CrazyPrepared>

</comment><comment><USER20> fyi, you should take a look at cloudloop (www.cloudloop.com). it has a nice command line interface that lets you sync data across providers (s3, rackspace, nirvanix, azure, etc).

</comment><comment><USER21> You can refer to this discussion for a tool for s3 backup

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=577717>

</comment><comment><USER22> Remember that Amazon is not infallible. In fact, Amazon has had at least two S3 outages that resulted in permanent data-loss.

Would you put all of your eggs in a bookstore who just recently decided to become an egg storage vendor?</comment>


Uninstall QuickTime for Windows now - <AUTHOR> http://www.infoworld.com/article/3056650/security/uninstall-quicktime-for-windows-now.html <comment><USER2> What will we use in it's place? I use Quicktime to scrub videos frame by frame, as I am an animator and use it for reference. I have not found another free video player that has this ability. VLC sure doesn't.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> If you uninstall QuickTime what are some of the alternative H.264 codec options available for embedded PowerPoint videos?

</comment><comment><USER3> Does this include the codecs? Because right now there's a ton of media production tools on Windows that don't work without Quicktime, and uninstalling it makes it much harder to do media production in Windows.</comment>


Ask HN: What do you use to take notes? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Standard Notes – A notes app with a focus on longevity, portability, and privacy | [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13421927](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13421927) (Jan 2017, 282 comments)

Ask HN: What do you use to take notes? | [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13218918](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13218918) (Dec 2016, 136 comments)

</comment><comment><USER3> Evernote for long term ones. It's terrible to write in, but does a good job with search and storage.

Jotterpad for 'sketches' on Android. Sublime for PC. Sublime has such good plugins for notes that I'm using it instead of a lot of checklist apps.

</comment><comment><USER4> Big fan of Tiddlywiki for its nonlinearity. You can see how it works without signing up or downloading anything; the site is itself an instance: [http://tiddlywiki.com/](http://tiddlywiki.com/)

<comment><USER5> I second this. For me, anything with tagging and search would work. Mine lives in Dropbox (it runs in Firefox) so it's backed up and available on all my machines. A lot of the notes and ideas in it start out on paper (e.g. written on the go, or whenever the idea strikes me) so I get the benefits of paper. But rediscovery becomes essential as the volume of notes get large. Paper is ineffective because of the lack of search capability.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Emacs org-mode. It's great, especially when including math formulas or code.

[http://luisquintanilla.me/2017/08/25/back-to-school-emacs- ed...](http://luisquintanilla.me/2017/08/25/back-to-school-emacs-edition/)

</comment><comment><USER7> Just apple notes for me. It's perfect as it syncs between all of my devices.

</comment><comment><USER8> Bear

</comment><comment><USER9> keep

</comment><comment><USER10> Fountain pen.

</comment><comment><USER11> onenote from Microsoft

</comment><comment><USER12> Zim notebook wiki

</comment><comment><USER13> Vim and paper.

<comment><USER10> My first reaction was "how do you write with Vim on paper?"

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> QuickMemo+

</comment><comment><USER15> sublime text and notebooks</comment>


Where do mobile payment services (paypal) store money - <AUTHOR>

Thinking of creating a mobile payment service for my country but I'm not entirely sure how the backend financial stuff wo rks for services like paypal (I am a developer) Can someone explain this <comment><USER2> Hi, basically they redirect "you" (as a client) from client's page to their own servers and there run all relevant stuff, like authorization, for instance. Don't forget they monitor all your(client's) actions and keep the history. If something abnormal happens the Hollywood principle begins to work. However, I think you wanna see PayPall API first. Cheers, Oleg.</comment>


Costco shopping on the day of a Coronavirus pandemic - <AUTHOR> https://www.cake.co/conversations/ttf5KVS/costco-shopping-on-the-day-of-a-coronavirus-pandemic <comment><AUTHOR> Disinfectants, toilet paper, and paper towels are out of stock, but, otherwise, things look normal for now...

</comment><comment><USER2> What is this Cake thing? Looks nice.

<comment><USER3> [https://www.cake.co/about](https://www.cake.co/about)</comment></comment>


The Halloween Documents (MS leaked memos 1998-2004) - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween_documents <comment><USER2> Always worth a reminder of their true nature.</comment>


My Wife Was Dying, and We Didn't Tell Our Children - <AUTHOR> https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2019/02/my-wife-and-i-didnt-tell-our-children-about-her-cancer/582709/ <comment><USER3> I had the opposite upbringing, and lived my childhood years knowing my father was terminally ill. Whilst hard, it made me into whom I am, and I'm thankful for knowing exactly what was going on so I could enjoy each moment I had with him.

<comment><USER4> Thank you for sharing. I wish my words didn't escape me in this moment, but I wanted to post something so you know your comment was appreciated with more than an up-vote.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I should have posted this earlier.

I usually come to HN for some good analytical cynicism.

But not today. I wish I hadn't read some of the comments on this thread. I get it you disagree, you'd do it better, or different or for xyz reason.

This is a story. A touching one at that, about a hard decision two individuals had to make and the sacrifices they made along the way because of that decision. Ultimately it's theirs to make. If you are ever in this exact situation yourself I don't think you look to an article for advice, but instead consolation.

We were invited in for a glimpse, I don't think we need to criticize these people we don't know. I don't even want to pretend to be able to justify their actions either. I don't know them.

<comment><USER5> I've had to face death at a young age. It may be their decision to make, but it's a decision I firmly believe is worth criticizing because it's unhealthy. For years I was in denial of my father's death and my family had trouble discussing his passing.

I came away from that incident realizing that it is never a good idea to lie or deny death. Discussing it early helps you and your family prepare and makes the years afterwards less traumatic, as you don't feel robbed of your time.

<comment><USER4> You're giving advice, and it's good advice. The article isn't advice it's a story and it's a good story.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> My brother's godfather died of lung cancer. It was sudden and a surprise to everyone because he kept it a secret. When I got diagnosed at 33 with colorectal cancer, I made sure to tell all my friends and family for a few reasons: 1) I didn't want to suddenly disappear out of their lives and 2) people keep these things to themselves and don't realize how many of their peers may be going through similar trials. Our mortality is what makes us human. It's been 6 years since the initial diagnosis and I'm still dealing with it to this day but I feel like I appreciate the time I spend with my friends and family more. They do, too, knowing that all these moments are intentional.

</comment><comment><USER7> While heart breaking, and terrible I feel we as a society have a very warped view of death. We're all way too afraid of it (including myself). It's probably a symptom of death these days in developed countries being so rare. Running away from it as I have learned makes it so much worse, than trying to learn some acceptance.

<comment><USER8> As a biological organism, life means literally everything.

Every part of you has evolved over millions of years for the sole purpose of sustaining your existence within this universe. The core intent behind all rational thoughts that a specimen can have is survival; either at the level of the organism or at a genetic level.

From the perspective of the organism, survival is literally the only thing that means anything at all. Therefore it makes perfect rational sense to be terrified of death.

What if there's nothing after death... for the rest of eternity? This thought makes most people extremely uncomfortable. It is the root of all fears. If death didn't exist, the word "fear" would probably not exit either.

I don't think that it's the rarity of death in developed countries which makes people more afraid of it; it's the other way round; that people's fear of death (which is a side effect of better education and weaker religion in developed countries) make them less likely to take risks which might cause them to die.

<comment> reading-at-work > What if there's nothing after death... for the rest of eternity?

I have been mulling over this for some weeks now, more intensely than ever before in my life. I'm only 24 but still terrified of the concept, and frankly it's poisoned every waking hour with a mild to extreme sense of dread and foreboding. My mind tends to fixate and freak out over life problems it can't solve, and this is the ultimate one that _no one_ can solve. I'm glad that I still have a lot of my life ahead of me, but I can't stop fixating on the infinite nothingness afterwards and what that truly means. It's to the point that doing enjoyable things day to day feels worthless and just reminds me that it's still all going to end, no matter what I do, and sends me back down a spiral of fear.

I know rationally that I shouldn't let it get to me, because there's nothing I can do, but that just makes me apathetic and hopeless. I'm hoping this is a phase that will just pass but if anyone has real advice for how to move through this I would be very grateful.

<comment><USER9> Well, you also didn't exist _before_ you were born, for a very long time.. Does that bother you too?

It's very common to have existential crises (and other related crises) in your teens/20s. I certainly did. I read some philosophy-type books on the meaning of life which helped with that. (Klemke's _The Meaning of Life_ anthology was one I remember that helped a lot.)

Ok, so... not living forever seems..bad? So..if you lived forever, that would somehow give you meaning to your life? I can't really see how it would, even if it were possible. An infinite life would probably be infinitely boring. (I don't think people really can imagine _forever_ or _eternity_ ) Surely the brevity of life makes its moments more precious. Think on what you're grateful for, treasure the people around you. What an amazing miracle it is to somehow be conscious, alive, here, now, on this planet.

I don't think "What is the meaning of life?" is a good question - we give our lives meaning by the things we're involved in. Who cares if they don't last forever? Is a piece of music, a meal, a conversation, a day, the worse for coming to an end?

People can help you, and it is a serious problem you are having. Get help if you need it - it's being strong to ask for help. Good luck.

p.s. Religion[0] provides answers, but false ones, as far as we know. Believing "we live forever", without any evidence, is just burying your head in the sand. Among the basic facts of life are that we are born and we die. Expecting the universe to be like a child's home, with loving parents and everything designed to make us feel good, a moral universe designed around human desires, is wishful thinking.

[0] (which I notice a sibling comment has recommended as a solution)

<comment><USER10> > _Religion[0] provides answers, but false ones, as far as we know._

It's good to know that this has finally been determined, presumably by teams of qualified scientists, philosophers, and the most honest of holy men.

Although, it does seem to render your characterization of consciousness as an "amazing miracle" in a somewhat awkward light.

<comment><USER9> "Don't be snarky."

Your first sentence seems mere sarcasm, and I don't get what you mean by the second. Only religious people are allowed to use the word 'miracle'? I don't know. If you'd used plain speaking and short words, we could've seen what you really have to say. As it is, I'm left wondering. I said 'as far as we know', which you misrepresent as me saying something about 'finally'. If you have evidence otherwise, you would've mentioned it I suppose; innuendo is all you have. Your quotation in the second sentence also misrepresents what I said. If that matters to you. You wrote like you are on the side of truth before you write a word, that all your audience here will recognize it, that eloquence and long words alone will deliver triumph. Less 'delicacy', more saying what you mean, please.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> One thing I have learned since having kids is how resilient and accepting they are of the concept of death. Our boys were quite young when they lost their grandfather (my dad) and their grandmother (my wife's mum) to long term illness.

When talking to them about it, they were surprisingly pragmatic about the whole thing, and _they_ even shifted the conversation to our own (my wife and I) mortality and the fact that we wouldn't be around forever.

I think it is a far healthier approach, and it helps the grieving process. I recall even in my childhood when my parents hid the facts that the family dogs had passed etc. - I always had some residual resentment towards them for that - the fact I couldn't say goodbye properly or that they thought I was too emotionally ill equipped to deal with it.

<comment><USER12> I won't generalize it.

I was the youngest child of an old couple, and I lost my mum about 10 years back, and I am going to lose my father sometime in future, and I have been constantly thinking about it - literally everyday I have time to think - <USER2> the last 20 years of my life. I am in my early 30s!

I have been grieving passively most of my life, because I have been acutely aware of the mortality of my parents, and cannot say its healthy. I wish I had "known" less about my parents mortality.

I guess, my point is - death of loved ones suck, and everyone handles grieving differently.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I think the best thing about this was the children understood. They acknowledged it was for the better.

I think a gift we have is not knowing when or how we are going to go.

If there is nothing I can do about it, Not sure if I would want to know the number of days my parents have, even if they are aged. Same way not sure if I would want my kids to know how much time I have.

We all are unique. Each family is unique. And it is also natural for humans to judge openly or subconsciously. But we do what we think is best for family.

I dread the day, science is going to put a number on a child as soon as it is born. I feel it would make our life miserable for everyone.

</comment><comment><USER14> This reminds me of a great This American Life episode, 'In Defense of Ignorance' [1], that deals with this theme, only the ignorant person was the one dying. It follows an elderly Chinese woman whose terminal cancer diagnosis was kept from her.

[1] [https://www.thisamericanlife.org/585/in-defense-of- ignorance](https://www.thisamericanlife.org/585/in-defense-of-ignorance) (act 1, What You Don't Know)

</comment><comment><USER15> Reminds me of the Stegner novel: All the Little Live Things.

</comment><comment><USER16> I think it's a big mistake to rob the children of this experience and of the opportunity to help.

<comment><USER17> Hopefully, you'll never have to make this decision. In the interim, why judge someone else?

<comment><USER18> What's wrong with judging people? It's essential to life. What often needs more care is being thoughtful with the outcome so people don't feel bad.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Why can't we as a society say it's ok for a dying person to be selfish.

It wasn't best for the kids, but that's ok.

What matters is the dying person was as happy as possible, which one can see, keeping it from the kids would have helped with.

The kids will find out about the lie and further lying that it was for "them" is where it's not healthy.

The concept they went through hardship by not knowing acknowledges their journey AND gives it value by saying it helped their parent in their final days rather than the awful guilt of not being able to help or even given the chance to help.

</comment><comment><USER20> That's horrible... If my spouse were dying I would absolutely tell my children, because time is short, and time is not always used to its fullest. Knowing puts that into perspective. Those poor children..

<comment><USER10> I'd encourage you to read the article. Those "poor children" evidently disagree with you.</comment></comment>


U.S. Military Is World's Biggest Polluter - <AUTHOR> https://www.ecowatch.com/military-largest-polluter-2408760609.html <comment><USER2> I am having trouble validating this claim:

"U.S. military action there has resulted in the desertification of 90 percent of Iraqi territory, crippling the country's agricultural industry and forcing it to import more than 80 percent of its food"

I can't find any citations in the source - most of the places I am looking talk about the destruction of irrigation systems _at the hand of the Iraqi state_. So at best the military is only partly responsible.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm not fan of the American propensity for projecting power with guns, but this article seems to be more than a little bit biased.

* The uranium mines mentioned belonged to the DOE.

* The link purportedly explaining why we caused desertification in Iraq carries no sources explaining this, other than a vague mention of US military policies (which in most cases are civilian political policies).

* The article in language is saying the military is currently the worlds biggest polluter, while mostly touching on issues from the cold war, before there were environmental rules of note.

This doesn't even touch on the absolute environmental devastation that the Soviet system left too.

In General the Military-Industrial complex is dirty, and left in its wake over the 40 years of the cold war, an environmental mess than will take 80 years to clean up, but that doesn't make any military currently the worlds largest anything, except possibly a waste of money.

</comment><comment><USER4> The USA military fills a space that would be filled by another power if there was no USA military.

I personally don't want that to be China. Not because I think they'd do a bunch of crazy things but because I think they'd slowly and methodically subvert other countries just like they're doing in the South China Sea.

While I agree 1000% we need to minimize the USA military, we also need a plan for other (UN) countries to contribute to a shared force or something similar that can police in place of the USA military. Even in turn policing the USA in cases of military overstepping.

EDIT: What I'm saying is this article points to a problem, but it's complex. I imagine with UN oversight a military force might actually be less of a polluter and we might slow down arms races as well.

<comment><USER5> Why should there be any superpower policing other countries? IMO, China, like any other country strong enough to put up a fight, so to speak, acts out of self-preservation. It's understandable if you look at US' decades long foreign policies.

<comment><USER4> Why are police necessary anywhere? To enforce the rules of the land that enact peace and order.

China is trying to steal territory from the Philippines, they arguably don't have the power to fight China. Without allies in the USA they'd have no recourse.

If every country was equal I'd agree with you, but they aren't, so we need protections for the smaller countries out there that get rolled over by the big countries.

Edit: Ideally we wouldn't need a police force, and I don't use Police force to mean what the US is doing in the middle east. I'm all about anti- interventionist policies. But I also don't want to see big governments roll over smaller ones, I think the UN is a good counter to that.

This is what I meant by South China Sea. [https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&c...](https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwitspX0xN_iAhVOOK0KHaygAagQtwIwA3oECAwQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DluTPMHC7zHY&usg=AOvVaw3JxEfFRnSDYqG4H_bwBSLz) Hopefully that link resolves correclty.

<comment><USER6> > _Why are police necessary anywhere? To enforce the rules of the land that > enact peace and order._

A police force is something formally established and democratically controlled. And it should not have private interests of its own, even less so on the same domain as the people it protects.

A superpower/global cop is a self-selecting entity that serves its own interests, and answers to no one.

<comment><USER4> That is exactly what I'm saying.

EDIT: With the caveat that. end edit.

In the absence of said democratically controlled police force I think the USA military is not the worst substitute. It's not a good one, but it's better than having no counter to other forces.

I would like to clarify. I want a UN controlled military of the size of the US military patrolling the world. NOT the USA. I'm only saying in the absence of a formally established "governing" body to world powers, we need them to be at a stalemate in power.

<comment><USER6> > _In the absence of said democratically controlled police force I think the > USA military is not the worst substitute. It 's not a good one, but it's > better than having no counter to other forces._

I dunno, WWII aside, the worst offenders of meddling with other countries, toppling governments, invading, plundering, and promoting their own interests, etc, in the 20th and 21st century, globally, were the US and USSR.

Not some "rogue states", especially not the small ones, who can't seriously do much to anybody outside their immediate borders anyway...

<comment><USER4> That's a fair point. But if we also compare the meddling in this century to those past this one has had the fewest deaths due to war, famine, etc. This is, from what I've seen, a commonly held principle is fundamental to my belief that the US isn't as bad as what we've had historically. If that is wrong then I need to re-evaluate my entire opinion here.

Again, I'm 100% not saying the US is perfect or should be in this role. I'm just kinda extrapolating that based on what previous super powers have done the USA/USSR are less aweful.

That could also be to religion losing a lot of it's hold over superpowers, but IDK that's pure speculation on my part.

I also want to say, I get your position and WANT the US out of it's role too. I know this is probably weird for an American to say but I'm super glad that there are other powers out there to push back on the US. I could see us running amok a lot more if there weren't.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> And what is somewhat amusing, is that the DoD has labelled energy independence as a critical factor for the military to have. As a result, they're been spending the last 10-15 years working on the tech for things like military microgrids and whatnot.

[https://www.nrdc.org/experts/christian-stirling- haig/budget-...](https://www.nrdc.org/experts/christian-stirling-haig/budget- deal-could-fuel-pentagon-green-energy-blitz)

[https://www.energydigital.com/renewable-energy/us- military-w...](https://www.energydigital.com/renewable-energy/us-military- winning-renewable-war)

[https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/for-the-u-s- mil...](https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/for-the-u-s-military- energy-resilience-has-long-been-a-priority)

I'm not saying there isn't a long way to go, but they're definitely aware of the problem.

</comment><comment><USER8> The US military is also one of if not the largest organization in the world. So this is unsurprising.

</comment><comment><USER9> The Runit Dome (concrete dome designed to contain nuclear waste) is leaking highly toxic and radioactive garbages out.[1][2] It's pretty nasty out there - let alone the environmental impact.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runit_Island](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runit_Island)

[2] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19959889](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19959889)

</comment><comment><USER10> are militaries in general just producing lots of toxic things (not surprising), and the US has the biggest footprint because it has the biggest military? or, is the us just particularly bad on a per unit basis

<comment><USER11> Any military that has jets, nuclear weapons, chemical weapons, etc. will have the same pollution problems as the US military. The US military is just so much bigger than everybody else's for a variety of complex reasons.

Also, it's a bit unfair to say "US Military" as if it is a single unified organization. I would bet the US Navy specifically is the biggest offender.

I bet "US Military" is smaller than "China Factories" though.</comment></comment>


The Creepy Line Trailer (YouTube) - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqlDtjnwyPA <comment><AUTHOR> Although I haven't seen it, this seems to be an interesting documentary: This was a very motivated crew to build a case against Google and Facebook. If there is any sort of proof for their claims, they would had found it. If not, the documentary itself stands as proof against itself.</comment>


What an online bank statement could be - <AUTHOR> http://ledger.likeminded.io/#/ <comment><AUTHOR> Description: A hack from a hackathon that melds intercom.io with getmondo.co.uk.

There are filters on the left hand side you can play with to refine the transaction list, or use the hot filters available on field hover to see transactions like that one.</comment>


Show HN: Declarative Angular Forms with JSON Schema - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/dashjoin/json-schema-form <comment><AUTHOR> Not the first of its kind but it is lightweight (<1000 loc), renders compact forms, and supports Draft 06</comment>


Gay marriage: the database engineering perspective (2014) - <AUTHOR> http://qntm.org/gay

<comment> jon-wood This is exactly the sort of thing I come to Hacker News for, both entertaining and thought provoking. If you're on the fence as to whether you want to read a blog post about database schemata do yourself a favour and give it a look.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Some of you probably need this soon. Also read this: [http://qntm.org/support](http://qntm.org/support)</comment>


Network-enabled web based ANSi art application - <AUTHOR> http://437.rocks/ <comment><AUTHOR> This is by Andy Herbert[1] of BlockTronics[2]

[1] [https://github.com/andyherbert/ansiedit](https://github.com/andyherbert/ansiedit)

[2] [http://blocktronics.org/projects/](http://blocktronics.org/projects/)

</comment><comment><USER2> Thanks, this looks fun and useful. It is worth checking out the artwork created by members of [http://blocktronics.org](http://blocktronics.org) to get a feel for the type of art that this tool is intended to help with, and for inspiration.</comment>


Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion-Eating_Poet_in_the_Stone_Den <comment><USER2> > "Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo." is a > grammatically correct sentence in American English, often presented as an > example of how homonyms and homophones can be used to create complicated > linguistic constructs through lexical ambiguity. It has been discussed in > literature in various forms since 1967, when it appeared in Dmitri > Borgmann's Beyond Language: Adventures in Word and Thought.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo_buffalo_Buffalo_buffal...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo_buffalo_Buffalo_buffalo_buffalo_buffalo_Buffalo_buffalo)

<comment><USER3> The big difference is that in Chinese, the written form of the poem is clear and unambiguous (if not terribly sensible), whereas in English that makes no sense without a detailed explanation of how you're supposed to parse it.

<comment><USER4> Yeah, I doubt anybody in real life (as opposed in an academic setting, or after having read this) ever actually knew more than 2 or 3 of those contrived definitions of buffalo (basically the animal and the place) needed to make this work...

<comment><USER5> There are only 3 meanings used in that sentence.

<comment><USER4> Looked it up and you're right, I remembered it as having more, but those (what was more) where the roles played by each of the repetitions of the 3 basic meanings (noun, verb, relative clause, verb phrase -- "buffalo", "buffaloed" (bullied), "from Buffalo", "to buffalo", "that's a bufallo (bully)", etc)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'd like to hear this poem recited ... found it at YouTube link: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vExjnn_3ep4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vExjnn_3ep4)

</comment><comment><USER7> Similar to how Singaporean English have dropped a bunch of ending consonants from English, Mandarin dropped a bunch of ending consonants from Middle Chinese. If you recited this in Cantonese (which is a bit more conservative dialect), the words would sound differently!

</comment><comment><USER8> Worth noting, that this poem only makes sense in its written form, not spoken form.

Had Chinese gone full Romanization, or some kinda phonetic written system, the trick would be lost.

<comment><USER9> Wikipedia doesn't have the text for fear of copyright, but you can see a phonetic/romanized version here: [https://www.theepochtimes.com/chinese- language-tonality-lion...](https://www.theepochtimes.com/chinese-language- tonality-lion-eating_1526691.html)

Or in a different system here: [http://www.fa- kuan.muc.de/SHISHI.RXML](http://www.fa-kuan.muc.de/SHISHI.RXML)

And there's a link to a reading in another comment.

While a part of the effect is that each hieroglygh is read the same, I'd say another part is that it still comes out making sense.

Seeing as modern English approaches being logographic, with its _"spelled 'Manchester', pronounced 'Liverpool',"_ I wonder how many homophones and oronyms can be jammed into a phrase.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> That's a fun poem for making your Chinese-speaking friends laugh. For English speakers, a similar kind of tongue-twister is The Chaos (Dearest Creature in Creation):

[https://www.hep.wisc.edu/~jnb/charivarius.html](https://www.hep.wisc.edu/~jnb/charivarius.html)

I'm (still) trying to learn Chinese, using my own web app to split words, romanise them, and translate them separately.

[https://pingtype.github.io](https://pingtype.github.io)

The hardest challenge for Chinese NLP is word spacing. I'm amazed that they still haven't welcomed the space character. English without spaces could be really confusing! Consider what happened with URLs: "thepenismightierthanthesword", "expertsexchange", "psychotherapist". That's amusing for single words, but I wonder if we could go longer.

If there's any poets here, I'd like to hear your best examples of English sentences that make sense, but with a different meaning, if spaces were added in different places.

<comment><USER11> You wrote Pingtype? I _love_ Pingtype! It is a pinned tab on my browser because I come across Chinese words so often (fellow learner here!)

I think not spacing Chinese is a problem that gets solved through experience. The word groupings will be of 2-3 characters max unlike English where words can be 1-12 letters long (unless it is for nouns like 喜马拉雅 = xi3ma3la1ya3 = Himalaya).

The examples you gave are edge cases but I am sure you can read "butishouldstoptypingnow" just fine. You never though to segment the word as "bu-tish-ould..." because you have an expectation of sentence and type of words that fill positions in the "<conjunction> <subject> <aux verb> <verb>..." format.

<comment><USER10> Wow, really? I have a user?! You seriously just made my day!

I've wasted so much time on that side project, to finally hear that someone else cares about it is so encouraging. Please email me - I've got lots more Pingtype data that I collected and parsed, but didn't upload yet.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Where's the text of the poem? This article used to have the text, along with transcriptions in Mandarin and Cantonese.

<comment><USER5> As the wikipedia article explains, the Chinese text is unremarkable. But here's the poem spoken - it's actually pretty good.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vExjnn_3ep4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vExjnn_3ep4)

And an English translation:

In a stone den was a poet called Shi Shi, who was a lion addict, and had resolved to eat ten lions. He often went to the market to look for lions. At ten o'clock, ten lions had just arrived at the market. At that time, Shi had just arrived at the market. He saw those ten lions, and using his trusty arrows, caused the ten lions to die. He brought the corpses of the ten lions to the stone den. The stone den was damp. He asked his servants to wipe it. After the stone den was wiped, he tried to eat those ten lions. When he ate, he realized that these ten lions were in fact ten stone lion corpses. Try to explain this matter.</comment></comment>


How Google's Blind Lawyer Does His Job - <AUTHOR> https://bol.bna.com/heres-how-googles-blind-lawyer-does-his-job <comment><USER2> I work with Jack on a regular basis. You couldn't ask for a more _fun_ colleague to work with too, he not only does all of those things but he does them with incredible grace.

His story really illustrates how we all need to start thinking more about accessibility features in the products we build, however time/budget constrained we might be.

</comment><comment><USER3> One of the things I really admire about Google is the effort it makes to be an inclusive workplace. I love that they'll go out-of-their-way to tailor the environment to be comfortable for anyone who happens to work there.

<comment><USER4> Supposedly, this is pretty much... the law in the United States. That you make reasonable accommodations to allow the disabled to do their jobs. However, Google is incredibly good at marketing and PR, and hence gets journalists to write posts like this for them.

<comment><USER5> Companies going out of their way to help the blind is not the norm.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It's interesting to me that he uses an iPhone instead of an Android phone. Apple must be fairly far ahead when it comes to accessibility.

<comment><USER7> From two years ago, but here's an account of the second attempt from a blind (iPhone) user at using Android: [https://marcozehe.com/30dayswithandroid/](https://marcozehe.com/30dayswithandroid/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> 620 words per minute? While I do not have any form of visual impairment, I wonder how useful it would be to be able to absorb spoken information at that pace.

Can anyone tell me more about this?

<comment><USER9> That stood out to me too, I imagine it's more akin to 'skimming' than reading each word for comprehension. Most legal documents are highly repetitive, full of legalese filler, and generally you just need to get the gist of something quickly rather than analyze it on a small scale. I bet that when he's carefully writing or reading an important clause it's at much less than 10 words a second.

<comment><USER10> Probably not "much less", I am not vision impaired but I use TTS every day; over time it becomes easier and easier to listen to higher and higher frequency speech (if the speaker can actually enunciate that fast.)

I currently use the fastest built in voice speed windows (by default) offers and I believe that is just slightly slower than 10 words per second(8 or 9.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> As if Daredevil was based on a true story.</comment>