Honestly it need not even be his demise. There are any number of countries he could flee to, countries without extradition treaties and willing to look the other way for any rich despot looking for a safe harbor. Some small Middle East dictatorship seems a logical choice. But even China would probably offer him refuge. Even North Korea if he’s truly desperate. Hell, if he offered to end the war tomorrow, most Western countries would probably be willing to offer Putin amnesty, as painful as that would be. If the choice is between holding Putin accountable and saving another hundred thousand innocent lives, I’ll let Putin go.

What he is truly afraid of is losing power. He can keep his life. He can keep at least a lot of his wealth. The one thing he can’t flee the country with is his power.

In the modern world, dictators never need fear their personal survival. International pariah dictators all support each other. There’s a reason Trump cozies up to despots. The dictators all realize that any of them could be deposed, and that losing power will result flight or death. They’re all paranoid and afraid of losing power and their lives. So they all backstop each other and provide what assistance they can. And what even the poorest dictator can offer is protection from extradition.

Who says I’m not?

Sorry. There is just something particularly vile about any human being claiming hereditary power over another, no matter how ceremonial. If I had it my way, I would make it a capital offense for the holder of any title of hereditary nobility to step foot on US territory. I don’t care how well liked a king is or how well funded their PR department. You cannot be a good person while claiming the right from birth to rule over other human beings. It’s a moral abomination.

Call me a militant anti-monarchist if you want. But I truly believe the only good king is a dead one.

The only good king is a dead one.

The opposite could also happen. Countries facing direct threats to their own territory are less able to provide military aid.

This isn’t a language issue. The two forms I’m contrasting use the same definition of “could.” But there is a world of difference between:

1. A scenario which is uncertain, but real information indicates there is a decent chance of happening. (The “could” used in the article.)

2. A scenario which theoretically could happen, but is unlikely and there is no particular evidence available that the scenario is likely. (The “could” you’re using in your hypothetical about Russia disintegrating.)

An infinite number of things are theoretically possible. The article isn’t some baseless speculation saying, “hypothetically, there’s nothing in the laws of physics preventing Russia from invading NATO.” The article is instead saying, “while the intelligence is still uncertain, intelligence indicates a substantial probability of Russia invading NATO territory.”

It’s an issue of probability. The article is probably talking about a scenario with a 30% chance of happening in the next year, a scenario that has real evidence suggesting it’s likely in the near-term. You’re raising a scenario that probably has less than a 1% chance of occurring in the next year, one backed by pure speculation with no evidence at all behind it.

Intelligence is never certain. That doesn’t mean it’s useless.

It makes a lot of sense. You’re ignoring what a realistic action and response would look like.

The goal wouldn’t be to conquer large swathes of NATO territory. The goal would be to test the integrity of the NATO alliance, and to see if the Russian sympathizer sitting in the White House will renege on the US’s obligations.

Imagine Putin sends a few hundred troops over the border and seizes a small amount of land. NATO is not going to use that as an excuse to launch a total war against Russia. Sure, if the full might of the Russian army comes storming into Poland, NATO would let loose everything we have. But a limited incursion like in Georgia? If NATO is living up to its promises, sufficient force would be deployed to drive them out. There would be no need to launch a total war.

This would be a way to test the NATO alliance at relatively low cost and risk. We don’t actually know how Trump would respond to this. He could very well say, “not our problem” and refuse to render aid. If he did command the US military to defend NATO territory, then the cost to Russia would be small. A few hundred casualties in a war that’s caused hundreds of thousands. A rounding error. A small price to pay.

But imagine what Putin gains if Trump doesn’t offer assistance against even a small incursion. NATO’s guarantees will have proven fruitless. Even if someone more friendly to NATO gets elected after Trump, the promise will still be broken. Every NATO member from then on knows that the NATO guarantees cannot be relied upon. A guarantee that is subject to the whims of which American political party is in power is not a guarantee that nations can rely on for their national defense.

Do you understand the difference between the two forms of could used below?:

In theory, I, a regular person, could put in a lot of time, effort, and money, and become an Olympic athlete.

I am an Olympic athlete. I am set to compete in the Olympics tomorrow. I’ve regularly placed in the top levels of my sport. I could win a gold medal tomorrow.

You know, I haven’t lived a perfect life. But unless things go in a real wild direction, at least I can say I’m extremely unlikely to ever do something so bad I get sentenced to death in absentia…

That article is unfortunately devoid of the information we need.

I however managed to find the Nature article that it appears to be based on.

https://annas-archive.pk/scidb/10.1038/nature02417/

Trees do face limits on their height due to the limits of the lengths capillary forces can draw water up through their cells. However, the figure quoted is from a regression analysis of living trees. It’s not a prediction of how tall trees could evolve if certain environmental stresses were removed. It’s a prediction of the maximum height achievable by California Redwoods.

From the paper:

At reserves further north and closer to the coast, stronger storms may explain the lower heights (,100 m), yet similar relationships of water potential and d13 C to height 27 as we observed in the tallest redwoods. At the drier inland margin of redwood’s natural distribution in northern California, maximum tree height is lower (,80 m), yet treetop values of minimum water potential (21.9 MPa) and maximum d13 C (222‰) are similar to those at 110 m in the tallest redwoods. Thus a similar physiological ceiling may be reached at different physical heights depending on water availability, with storm damage reducing realized heights at sites that are otherwise optimal

So note that even though the trees on the coast have moisture conditions, they still reach lower heights than those further inland.

The key thing to keep in mind is that the current maximum height achievable by living tree species is not the maximum height of trees allowable by physics. For example, instead of relying only on osmotic pressure, trees might evolve a staged-lift system, where they have upper reservoirs that feed one into the next. This is how tall skyscrapers handle their plumbing systems. A hundred story building will have water tanks at different levels rather than just one big tank on the roof. This prevents the need to have pipes at the base of the skyscraper capable of surviving 100 stories worth of water pressure.

There’s no need for trees on our planet to evolve such mechanisms. The limits for wind kick in at similar heights to the limits of the water transport mechanisms trees have evolved. But other mechanisms would have different limits. There just isn’t any evolutionary pressure to develop them.

Although, the paper does make being a tree scientist sound like an amazing job.

We accessed tree crowns by shooting arrows trailing filament over branches with a powerful bow. Rope was then hauled over the branches and climbed via mechanical ascenders. Access to the treetop was achieved by arborist-style techniques. Heights were measured by lowering weighted fibreglass measuring tapes from the treetop to average ground level.

Wind dominates the morphological structure of trees. Weight is not the limit to tree height. Trees could grow many times their current maximum height on a planet with no wind. You could hang iron weights on most trees much greater than the weight of the tree. As long as the wind wasn’t blowing hard, the tree would stand.

Wind, the movement of something as light as air, is able to dominate the form land plants have evolved into.

Now realize that water has a thousand times the density of air.

There’s a reason all it takes to cause a local explosion of diversity in sea life is to dump something solid like a subway car into the sea. Water has so much momentum behind it that life struggles just to remain firmly fixed in one place while subject to waves and current.

EDIT: Also one other major structural factor: soil! Dry well compacted soils are stronger than moist loose soils. The sea bed is an ever-churning bed of loose water logged mud and sand. So not only are ocean plants subject to much greater lateral loads due to the 1000x density of water over air, but those ocean plants also must cling to the worst foundation imaginable.

The barrels in those tanks are rated for 1500 shots. That’s all you’ll get out of the tank. Sure, you can call the barrel a spare part and assume another one is at the ready, but at that point I’ll start asking why the Allies can’t just start assembling other Abrams from the infinite spare parts pile.

So they lure it over a pit packed to the brim with dynamite. Throw enough explosives at anything and it will be destroyed. And if there’s only one of them, they will put the effort in to disable it.

That’s exactly how human mods operate. Human mods tend to be the “zero tolerance, zero thought” types.

How about Sogno di Volare?

After Android TV support, next comes Android Auto support!

The average salary in Malta is under $25k. And with plenty of folks making far less than that. You’re talking about half a decade’s income for the average person. And that’s before you get into more coercive scenarios, like someone being deep in debt, about to lose their home, etc. Imagine you had been out of work awhile and were about to lose your home. The mortgage is past due and the bank calls every day. Meanwhile, you’re working odd jobs just to keep your three kids fed, while you skip meals. Someone comes to you and offers you a deal. They’ll give you enough money to pay your mortgage off in full. In exchange, you have to kill someone. (In this scenario, let’s assume your ex-military or somehow else have the necessary skills.) They even give you a long spiel about how awful the target is, and how they actually deserve it. Hell, this is an act of good, an act of vigilante justice, they tell you!

Would you take that deal?

I hope I wouldn’t. But I can imagine why people would.

If Jesus were to come back today, he would be born via a miraculous pregnancy to a Central American transgender woman living in an ICE detention facility.

I’m hoping for a good old-fashioned Pope/Anti-Pope fight. That’s where two men both claim the thrown of St. Peter at the same time, usually each with their own power base. And of course, the first thing they each do is excommunicate each other!

I stopped participating on reddit awhile back, but I still lurk on some trans subreddits. I always use old.reddit. It’s the only way to use reddit that doesn’t feel like using a another Fisher Price infantilizing app. If I can’t access old.reddit, I’ll stop lurking even on the subreddits I lurk on.