genderwhy

The answer to that is complex, and involves personal finances, shame, papering over concerns, the desire to use electricity as fuel, not understanding what the other options were, etc. etc.

People get attached to bad ways of doing things all the time. This was no different.

It looks like it steals energy from an object in motion, in this case a black hole. (Presumably because this is a dense object so you can get closer to it.)

Existing satellite slingshot maneuvers steal energy from the thing they slingshot around -- every satellite that slingshots off earth steals a very, very small amount of energy from the earth. The closer you get to the center of Earth's mass, the more energy you can steal. It's just that in Earth's case there's all this "atmosphere" and "lithosphere" garbage preventing you from snuggling up right close to the center.

With a black hole, all that stuff is compressed, so you can get closer and steal some of its kinetic energy. (If I understand the concept correctly.)

> If you bought a Tesla, I'm especially sorry.

Drove a Tesla for ~10 years. What a disaster of a vehicle to own. Great delight to drive, huge headache owning it.

Those places have strong gender roles though? Like, the arab world is sort of well known for having portions that very strictly define gender roles...

That's the opposite of what the parent was suggesting I think?

Are rogue waves just the various component waves on different frequencies lining up "perfectly" such that they sum to one large wave? Or are they a different phenomena?

It's reached sort of high school level garage band renditions of the songs, imo.

So yes, it's off, but also it's impressive? It fits into an interesting place where it's very cool and also has clear room for improvement.

Fair enough. Where is this?

Cool! Where is this?

Yep! You are 100% correct. But good luck with this crowd. HN is all over the place with the gender != sex discussion.

I would associate N/A more with agender (someone who has no gender) more than someone who has a gender but it is not listed. For me, my gender is applicable, it's just not in that list.

"Not Listed" might be a better title for N/A?

Edit: Just saw your edit, makes more sense. Still feels a little on the edge for me, but we're all going to have different needs out of something like this.

A very very very extremely minor adjustment might be to rename "other" to "not listed".

The reasoning is that the word "other" can be alienating to some folks. The way we use the phrase "the other" to imply something foreign and untrustworthy in common language is a good example of why someone might not want to be called "other" in a form.

Now, this is a really minor thing, and won't impact 99.9+% of your users. But it could impact a few people! It's ultimately up to you whether you think it's clearer/more appropriate for your app to use "other", "not listed", or something else! My goal is not to be prescriptive, just to provide a little color and reasoning.

Well, my choices are Not Known (which is false) or N/A (which is also false). As a nonbinary person, I generally don't feel included by that form?

Where are you from that your nation doesn't have some concept of gender (differing societal roles for, e.g., men and women)? I'm genuinely asking because I think it would be interesting to learn more about the language and culture.

The answer is multifaceted:

1) Because that's how people do it. Sometimes we all collectively settle on a standard that isn't the best, but that's just how it's done.

2) It allows for more easily expanding to multiple pronouns, e.g. "he/they" or "she/they", which indicate that the person is ok with "she/her/hers" or "they/them/theirs".

3) It makes it easier to state neopronouns (e.g. xe), by standardizing the form -- he/him/his is the same format as sie/hir/hirs or xe/xem/xems.

4) (My opinion) It feels more natural to say "he him" than just "he". "What are your pronouns?" "He." I dunno, it's a short enough utterance that it could be easily to mishear?

What you've described is what most non-binary, trans, and many queer folks believe. (And many allies as well.)

The idea that there are "only two" genders is, imo, a bit of a 20th century lens, and I expect we'll move to disentangle gender from what anatomy do you have.

I agree that asking for gender is fraught. I am non-binary, and I constantly have to either lie or just choose "Not sharing". The best systems just take a string and leave it at that.

Gathering this by employers is part of US federal law. It is also passed to your insurer, and used to do... insurance things invisibly.

Gathering this by companies is so they can better profile you and serve you tailored content (as defined by them.) E.g. If you respond "Man", they might want to send you fewer ads for tampons and more ads for razors or whatever. Note, I'm not saying this is a good thing, but it's the reasoning.