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Case law, also known as common law, is a British legal tradition. Most of the EU does not follow the common law tradition. There may be supreme courts, but the notion of binding precedent, or stare decisis as in the US legal system does not exist. Appeal and Supreme court decisions may be referenced in future cases, but don't establish precedent.

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precedent>

The equivalent doctrine under a civil legal system (most of mainland Europe) is jurisprudence constante, in which "if a court has adjudicated a consistent line of cases that arrive at the same holdings using sound reasoning, then the previous decisions are highly persuasive but not controlling on issues of law" (from above Wikipedia link). See:

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jurisprudence_constante>

Interestingly, neither the principle of Judicial Review (in which laws may be voided by US courts) or stare decisis are grounded in either the US Constitution or specific legislation. The first emerged from Marbury v. Madison (1803), heard by the US Supreme Court (<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marbury_v._Madison>), and the second is simply grounded in legal tradition, though dating to the British legal system. Both could be voided, possibly through legislation, definitely by Constitutional amendment. Or through further legal decisions by the courts themselves.


Yeah I'm really glad we don't have common law where I live. It makes the law way too complicated by having all these precedents play a role. If the law is not specific enough we just fix it.

Also it breaks the trias politica in my opinion. Case in point: the way the Supreme Court plays politics in the US. It shouldn't really matter what judge you pick, their job is to apply the law. But it matters one hell of a lot in the US and they've basically become legislators.


For someone out of the loop, which ones have backfired, other than Ring/Flock?


Good idea. Thanks.

One other, which captures the sentiments in this case better (I was going to edit my parent, but you've already replied):

<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25813319>

Appreciated.


Sagan's kit is one of several similar resources I'd turned up ... over a decade ago now ... when I'd begun considering the matter of epistemics in media, particularly online discourse. The situation's not improved.

My catalogue is here: <https://web.archive.org/web/20200121211018/https://old.reddi...> (archive).

It includes in addition to Sagan: Rory Coker's precis on pseudoscience, the Venn Diagram of Irrational Nonsense, the concept of falsifiability, an informative (if excruciatingly painful) BBC docu on stupidity, Frankfurt's "On Bullshit", Ferguson on why youth culture made everything suck, Brandolino's Law, Silver's Bullshitter's Inequality, a relationship between the Kübler-Ross model and the Dunning-Kruger Effect, The Periodic Table of Irrational Nonsense, and Adams's 'B'-Ark.


And you can escape asterisks using backslashes:

Italic

*Escaped asterisks*

\*Double-Escaped asterisks\*

  *Italic* 
  
  \*Escaped asterisks\*

  \\*Double-Escaped asterisks\\*
(tomhow seems to have goofed his escapes above. As I've done many times myself...)

GP comment since corrected, for the curious. And/or future me.


Oh indeed. I was referring to how the community itself views it by their choices to flag or not flag things. But thank you for the confirmation of my understanding.

Apparently Luke Kaiser is the originator of that form, though there are antecedents:

<https://quoteinvestigator.com/2025/06/04/age-treachery/>


There are several books which explore this concept, viewing history through the lens of energy systems available to and utilised by humans.

Vaclav Smil has written two of these, Energy and Civilization (2017) and Energy in World History (1994). They cover much the same ground, though with different emphases.

<https://vaclavsmil.com/book/energy-and-civilization-a-histor...>

<https://vaclavsmil.com/book/energy-in-world-history/>

Manfred Weissenbacher's Sources of Power (2009) more specifically addresses political and military implications of different power systems.

<https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/sources-of-power-9780313356261...>

In the past year there's a new book on the topic, Energy's History: Toward a Global Canon, by Daniela Russ and Thomas Turnbull, though I've yet to read it.

<https://www.sup.org/books/politics/energys-history>

There's a review here: <https://networks.h-net.org/group/reviews/20131545/priest-rus...>.


Heat rejection is far more challenging in vacuum.

3/4 cup is about 315 ml, or another 315 g, for just over 400g cooked weight. The linked article does not make clear whether or not the 300g is dry or cooked weight.

The original paper describes two protocols, short-term and long-term (2-day and 6-week respectively) of 100g dry oats and 80g dry oats prepared for each meal. That's a generous but not outrageous serving size, and the former comes out to 300g oats per day over three meals.

<https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-026-68303-9#Sec15>


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