The sunk cost discount and the trip cost scaling problem

Cars are more expensive, but not when you already own one

 Posted on 2023-07-27  |  9 minutes  |  1912 words  |  Carmen Bianca Bakker

You know how sometimes you see a common phenomenon, and you think there should logically already exist word for that phenomenon, but no matter how hard you search, you can find no such word? That’s what this article is about. I want to create new terms for two existing phenomena that, in my limited understanding, are not well-explored1 in spite of how common they are. I’m going to call them the sunk cost discount and the trip cost scaling problem. [Read More]
New urbanism  Opinion 

Cars as asbestos

Let's unironically ban cars

 Posted on 2023-07-02  |  10 minutes  |  1926 words  |  Carmen Bianca Bakker

Since moving to Brussels1, I have been radicalised against the automobile. I came from the Dutch countryside, where cars are kind of necessary to get anywhere meaningful, but where other modes of transport do exist and are feasible. I spent six years cycling one hour to school and one hour back, and I spent a few more years doing a commute of 1h30 by two buses and a train to university. [Read More]
Opinion 

What's in a name?

A happy thought for International Transgender Day of Visibility

 Posted on 2021-03-31  |  5 minutes  |  922 words  |  Carmen Bianca Bakker

Often when people conceptualise transgender people, there is a misery inherent to our identity. There is the everyday discrimination, gender dysphoria, the arduous road of transition, and the sort of identity crisis that occurs when we let go of one name and choose another. And while being transgender certainly can be all of that, it’s a pity that the joyous aspects are often forgotten, or disappear behind all the negative clouds that more desperately require society’s attention. [Read More]
Gender  Personal 

Destination status quo

A reflection on idealism and the inadequacy of things

 Posted on 2021-02-12  |  12 minutes  |  2374 words  |  Carmen Bianca Bakker

I recently happened upon an article1 that argued against the four freedoms as defined by the Free Software Foundation. I don’t actually want to link to the article—its tone is rather rude and unsavoury, and I do not want to end up in a kerfuffle—but I’ll include an obfuscated link at the end of the article for the sake of integrity. The article—in spite of how much I disagree with its conclusions—inspired me to reflect on idealism and the inadequacy of things. [Read More]
Opinion  Free software 

Using Fedora Silverblue for development

 Posted on 2021-02-05  |  5 minutes  |  1052 words  |  Carmen Bianca Bakker

I recently switched to Fedora Silverblue for my development machine. I want to document approximately how I do this (and why it’s awesome!). Fedora Silverblue This article is not an introduction to Fedora Silverblue, but a short summary is well-placed: Fedora Silverblue is an immutable operating system that upgrades atomically. Effectively, the root filesystem is mounted read-only, with the exception of /var, /home, and /etc. The system is upgraded by mounting a new read-only snapshot as the root filesystem. [Read More]
Free software  GNU/Linux