The concrete and cement sector has been trying to reduce its environmental impact for years through sustainable concrete mixtures or efficient designs.
Now, a research team at the University of Pennsylvania has combined both novel materials and a material-saving design, without compromising on strength and durability.
The project, called Diamanti, takes inspiration from nature and uses a robotic 3D printer to create complex, lattice-like patterns with a sustainable concrete mixture.
While most regular concrete absorbs carbon dioxide (up to 30% of its production emissions over its entire life cycle, according to some research), Diamanti’s enhanced concrete mixture absorbs 142% more carbon dioxide than conventional concrete mixes.
Its first design, a pedestrian bridge, uses 60% less material while retaining mechanical strength, says Masoud Akbarzadeh, an associate professor of architecture at the University of Pennsylvania and director of the lab that spearheaded the project.
You’re really going with this being as bad as the N-word? I mean, I get you don’t like the term, but that’s false equivalence. I’ve gotten an earful on this from other mods and admins, so, point taken.
But get off your high horse. There was nothing demeaning or discriminatory about that usage. If you choose to believe there was, that’s on you. Communication requires a sender and a receiver, and in this case, you were looking for outrage in an innocuous setting, found it, and turned a one-off into a federal case. “Short-haired women” sounds idiomatically wrong, and I just searched my own history for use of the word “chick.” I’ve been using it on Beehaw for two years, and you’re the first person to have had a problem with it.
You’re making a number of assumptions about both me and my idiolect. This being a safe space doesn’t mean hypercorrecting so that you feel safe and others feel attacked. Just look at how far off the rails we are from the actual topic so you can go off on a holier-than-thou excursion. I hope you’re happy that you caused hours of argument because you somehow felt personally attacked by a movie reference.
I feel like you similarly project a lot onto me right now. I didn’t say using the word “chick” is as bad as the n-word. And I’m also not super mad about you using it. In fact, I tried to just casually point out that it’s not the coolest word to use. The problem is, and here I brought in a similar discussion led when talking about slurs, that it is often very tedious to discuss with privileged people who cling to those words because they don’t want to give up the freedom to use those terms. These kinds of discussions tend to be less constructive and more heated. It seems you are very defensive about this yourself, otherwise, why would you write multiple long responses about it?
In short, sorry, if I came off super aggressive. I really just meant it to be a friendly reminder, that we should from time to time check our language and that in my eyes “chick” is a very demeaning term. Do what you want with it, I would feel safer in this community, if you’d stop using “chick” to talk about women.
Thank you for the reasoned response. I’ve been blindsided by the reaction, given that it’s just part of what I say.
But I do want to say that you’re making a blanket statement. Go to a rave, a punk show or a BDSM event, and this is standard terminology. Like, I’m part of the counter-culture, and part of what we intentionally do is piss people off.
It’s not to be exclusionary; rather, it’s to point out that one view is not all views. What’s saddening is that the reaction is “but you should have a different lens.” This is where I take issue.
This said, if “chick” is the problem we face as a country, thank god we have universal healthcare, poverty has been erased, and cancer has been cured.