u/Exaltist

For me it's philosopher Clément Vidal. I base my idea surrounding Synversalism around his concept of artificial cosmogenesis. I actually found out about him after I decided that creating Universes was the most crucial part of transforming the future, but I honestly thought at one point that nobody thought like me. I add more to my idea than what Vidal proposes, including adding a layer of theology of pantheism and syntheism on top of his philosophy, transforming it into a sort of personal credo of mine, but my curiosity led me to buying his book and trying to understand him better.

Hello everybody. As the title suggests, I drink soda. A lot of it. In fact, I drink soda almost as much as smokers smoke cigarettes. I know it's bad for me. It's one vice I don't want to give up.

Anyways, for a really long time I did Sodastream. I've had three machines over my lifetime because I used it so often the old ones broke.

I would like to tell you the pros and cons of Sodastream verse can soda. As someone whose done both recently and over the course of his lifetime, I feel like I have some say on this.

Sodastream doesn't really cost much less. If you buy the syrup and CO2 tanks in bulk, yes, it will cost a little bit less. But I will note that it is easier to store the CO2 tank and syrup bottles than putting a bunch of soda in your fridge. The syrup bottles are easier to take home with you if you don't own a car, obviously. But I recently signed up for Walmart+ so that isn't an issue anymore.

Can soda always tastes better than Sodastream, and has much more variety than Sodastream. Although Sodastream does have significant variety, if I want caffeine free Pepsi, Sodastream only offers it if I get it with diet Pepsi. I should let you guys know that Pepsi now owns Sodastream. They didn't when I first started using it.

And about the flavor. Sodastream syrups, even the non-diet kind, kind of taste like diet soda. This is because all Sodastream syrups have some amount of fake sugar in it, and non-diet syrups have both real and fake sugars in them.

Another downside with Sodastream is, even if you use cold water to make it, it won't be as cold as cans in the fridge. And if you put the Sodastream bottle in the fridge, by the time you take it out you'll lose a lot of the carbonation you put into it. And flat soda doesn't taste good - trust me, I had it before.

But on the plus side, with Sodastream there's a lot less waste. No cans, no cardboard boxes for 12 and 24 packs of soda and the bottles they use, which can be half to a full liter, can be used for years without having to throw them away. And the newer ones are dishwasher safe.

Another thing about Sodastream is despite having the word "soda" in it, it's really more of a carbonation machine that can do more than just soda. Sometimes I'll carbonate the soda and put Mio drops in it. For people who want to lose weight, it's a great way to get flavored seltzer water.

Sodastream's CO2 tanks can be shipped and delivered through the mail. The syrup bottles can be found online and in most department stores. That did make it more convenient in the past, but now that Walmart delivers groceries, I can get as much can soda delivered in my apartment per month. I don't even pay the minimum markup because I order so much.

There's other benefits to Sodastream, such as being able to make it as much or as little carbonation as you want, and you control how much flavor you get with the syrup. I would say overall Sodastream is more convenient than can soda.

So which one would I recommend?

If you care about taste, diversity or coldness of soda - go with can soda.

If you care about waste or saving the environment - go with Sodastream.

If you care about cost - either will be fine, but in order to save money with Sodastream you'll have to buy in bulk.

If you care about convenience or drinking as much soda as possible - go with Sodastream. One syrup bottle is about a 24 pack and it's easier to store them than can soda.

I figure that many people here are involved in smaller religions, because the larger religions have their own subreddits. Sometimes people try to validate their religion because there's a lot of people in it. So how do you feel when people do that to you? And try to invalidate your opinions because so few people believe what you believe? When I was a teenager, forming my own beliefs, my then Catholic mom would say things like "I wish I baptized you" or "There's more Catholics/Christians than whatever you believe", trying to invalidate my religious experience and expressions of it because I think differently than her. Now that she's an atheist she just tells me to stop talking about religion altogether, which in my opinion is just as bad because religion is one of the most fascinating subjects to me. Given the fact that my family never validated my religious beliefs, talking about it to them has always been difficult with them. How do you feel when your religion is invalid to others?