oh wow, that is gorgeous

I don't particularly agree with that, as it would essentially require exponential change in biases for a population to be considered open-minded, which isn't how societys work. But even so, the study did actually show an increased rate of change towards positive sentiment corresponding with the boom in travel. Perceptions shifted from trending negative to trending increasingly positive during the period of inflection they describe.

My perception of the COVID years was... quite the opposite, at least outside of my immediate bubble. It felt like polarization and isolation increased more intensely that I'd ever seen. And the strong negative impact on conservative-leaning populations has been well documented.

Oh man, idk how I've missed that one, but it just shot to the top of my list

I did not know until this very moment how deeply I wanted to build a beaver society 😂

I mean, I very much get how it feels that way given the current political climate, but the data does indicate Americans have gotten more open-minded over time, especially about racial/cultural differences.

And this study specifically notes a huge shift in rhetoric about immigration between 1945-1965 - correlating with the big boom in travel in the 40s, post WWII, and jet travel coming into play in the 50s-60s - two of the biggest increases in American travel. And the overall trend positive has continued, despite the increased polarization in the last couple decades.

I'm not at all saying that increased travel caused all of this, correlation is not causation and society is way more complex than that. But the trends are there, at least.

Personally, I rather prefer Maya Angelou's take-

"Perhaps travel cannot prevent bigotry, but by demonstrating that all peoples cry, laugh, eat, worry, and die, it can introduce the idea that if we try and understand each other, we may even become friends."

Travel is not some magical, all-powerful cure for the ills of the traveller or the world. And when done without care, without awareness, it can do a great deal of harm. But it is also a powerful tool to foster connection, which in turn breeds understanding. And that is dearly needed in our world.

Ooh cool - it feels like subnautica but in the sky, which is certainly promising

Nice, I was really hoping someone would start a lunarpunk community!

Love it, but it has pretty niche utility.

It's great for improving frest fruit/vegetable access in small urban communities, without massive transportation costs and preservative use.

Also very cool for small, isolated environments like ocean voyages and space, where production space is severely limited.

And extremely interesting from an ecological perspective when combined with a full circle microsystem, as in aquaculture.

But overall, it remains wildly inefficient for large scale agriculture needs.

TX lawmakers are going to doom the state, again. "make no mistake, the 9th largest economy in the world runs on natural gas" - more like the largest laughing stock in the world blacked out the whole state on natural gas...

Wind was hit far less by the 2021 freeze, and solar was hardly impacted at all. Meanwhile, they continue to advocate for overreliance on under equipped natural gas facilities that completely failed to maintain functionality - shutting down TX for days, and killing 200 people as a result. Solar is the best option they have to prevent it from happening again, short of a total power grid overhaul, but instead of celebrating growth there, they decide to fearmonger about scary renewables.

Personally, as it currently stands, no. But it could potentially be, given better waste treatment practices and far better regulation and consistently enforced safety requirements.

It's far greener than fossil fuels, when run carefully at least. But between the persistent issues with waste reclamation and harmful leakage, and the massive amount of damage that can be done when mistakes are made or safety is overlooked, I don't think it qualifies as "green".

So from a practical standpoint, I still think new resources are better spent developing infrastructure for solar, wind, geothermal, etc. But as we are phasing out other power sources, pretty much everything else should go before we start to decommission nuclear.

Always nice to see Braiding Sweet grass referenced. And to see Anmism treated with respect. It pairs so beautifully with a solarpunk mentality - each enhances the other.

Tidalpunk is my new favorite solarpunk subgenre. That's a brilliant aquaculture setup

Don't get me wrong, buying time to stall ecological collapse is better than doing nothing, but it's so frustratingly backwards when it becomes the priority over addressing the issues that are causing that collapse in the first place.