Slashdot Mirror

"Instead, in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, students seem to have shifted their view of what they should be studying—in a largely misguided effort to enhance their chances on the job market."
"Students aren’t fleeing degrees with poor job prospects. They’re fleeing humanities and related fields specifically because they think they have poor job prospects."
"If the whole story were a market response to student debt and the Great Recession, students would have read the 2011 census report numbering psychology and communications among the fields with the lowest median earnings and fled from them. Or they would have noticed that biology majors make less than the average college graduate, and favored the physical sciences. Most 18-year-olds are not econometricians, and those that are were probably going to major in economics anyway."
"But most of the differences are slight—well within the margins of error of the surveys."

I think this is where Schmidt really messes up. Maybe some students are still not avoiding some of the bad economic choices, but I think after story after story of people who go bankrupt from choosing the wrong college degree and suffering from the college debts and being worse off financially than if they had gotten no degree at all, I think students listened to those stories.

"The top-paying college majors earn $3.4 million more than the lowest-paying majors over a lifetime."
Source:
https://cew.georgetown.edu/cew...

• 1 Computer Science
• 2 Engineering
• 18 Arts
• 19 Graphic Design
• 20 History
• 21 English
• 22 Social Services

https://www.forbes.com/sites/s...

Millions of dollars seems more than a "slight" difference to me.

Schmidt left off a few important graphs: 1) The decline of humanities compared to the cost of college over time. 2) The average income by degree.

That’s some pretty extraordinary claim, I’m going to need extraordinary evidence.

Why don't you just admit that there is no evidence you would believe, and that until Penn & Teller tell you it's OK, there is no amount of peer-reviewed research you will ever accept? It would save us a lot of time with me providing citations and you not looking at them and deciding they're BS.

https://bioethics.georgetown.e...

http://www.resuscitationjourna...

There's lots more where that came from. I just picked this off the top.

Did you read your own link? Because neither link support the idea of OBE or consciousness existing outside the brain.

Let me summarize them for you since you took the assertion that I wouldn’t read it: there’s evidence of consciousness after clinical death. The brain does things we don’t fully understand yet. But it’s a huge leap to say that our consciousness exist outside your brain. Here’s a movie analogy, you believe consciousness is like “Dr. Strange” while existing evidence says it’s more like “Jacob’s Ladder.”

That’s some pretty extraordinary claim, I’m going to need extraordinary evidence.

Why don't you just admit that there is no evidence you would believe, and that until Penn & Teller tell you it's OK, there is no amount of peer-reviewed research you will ever accept? It would save us a lot of time with me providing citations and you not looking at them and deciding they're BS.

https://bioethics.georgetown.e...

http://www.resuscitationjourna...

There's lots more where that came from. I just picked this off the top.

Well, maybe things got off to a bad start with the Iranian Islamists taking the US embassy staff hostages, Iran declaring the US to be an enemy they are at war with, continuing to hold rallies to this day where "Death to America!" is chanted, referring to the US as "the Great Satan," spreading terrorism throughout the world, continually uttering barely veiled threats of genocide, and working to arm themselves with nuclear weapons. Well, live and learn.

I'm curious, have you, on a personal note, spoken to any Iranian homosexuals? Oh, that's right, you can't. They don't exist.

Iran vs. Its People: Abuses Against Religious Minorities

Iran 2016/2017

The authorities heavily suppressed the rights to freedom of expression, association, peaceful assembly and religious belief, arresting and imprisoning peaceful critics and others after grossly unfair trials before Revolutionary Courts. Torture and other ill-treatment of detainees remained common and widespread, and were committed with impunity. Floggings, amputations and other cruel punishments continued to be applied. Members of religious and ethnic minorities faced discrimination and persecution. Women and girls faced pervasive violence and discrimination. The authorities made extensive use of the death penalty, carrying out hundreds of executions, some in public. At least two juvenile offenders were executed.

Do not underestimate the power of the prez. He alone is the ONLY person in the US who cannot be indicted on any federal crime while prez. Further, it is a matter of debate if he can be indicted on any state level crime. ... It has never been tested.

You've contradicted yourself, you make the claim that the prez is immune, then say it has never been tested. There is no real legal precedent for the POTUS to be indicted while president. The closest instance of that was the Reagan/Watergate scandal, and the decision was never legally made. More reading here, and a more detailed analysis from 1997 here.

My own interpretation is that the POTUS is not any more immune than any other elected official, considering a Senator could be summoned for jury duty or personally sued for something, but I am no legal scholar and my opinion means jack.

He ought to have meant people as noncitizens still retain rights.

Are Foreign Nationals Entitled to the Same Constitutional Rights As Citizens?
 

many members of the general public presume that noncitizens do not deserve the same rights as citizens. But the presumption is wrong in many more respects than it is right. While some distinctions between foreign nationals and citizens are normatively justified and consistent with constitutional and international law, most are not. The significance of the citizen/noncitizen distinction is more often presumed than carefully examined. Upon examination, there is far less to the distinction than commonly thought. In particular, foreign nationals are generally entitled to the equal protection of the laws, to political freedoms of speech and association, and to due process requirements of fair procedure where their lives, liberty, or property are at stake.

Technically speaking, RT is based out of Moscow, and is a foreign corporation. The 1st Amendment rights of corporations is still a gray area, and Constitution protections for foreigners is still highly subjective and is still decided on a case-by-case basis. Even cases such as Citizens United really only touch on campaign contributions as a "form" of free speech, and contrary to popular belief, was pretty limited in the resultant decision. There have been many court cases that have decided that foreign nationals are not automatically covered under the Bill of Rights as these where meant for actual citizens of the US. Combining these factors together, this leads to the conclusion that RT would NOT be covered under any 1st Amendment rights.

As for the evidence of Russian involvement, there is proof. However, the actual "list" or whatever is currently still highly classified and not released into the general public yet. The real question is if the involvement was coordinated on the "state level", and was the Trump administration an active participant in said involvement or just a beneficiary. There is evidence of similar tampering in France; however Marcon's cyber team was prepared for this and may have actually done some preemptive "informational poisoning" to derail it.

People who can't see this trail are just keeping their heads buried in the sand; I blame it on something akin to the "beaten spouse syndrome". However, I don't think Clinton was a very good candidate either, and would have brought her own long list of issues with her. It's sad that out of 330 million people these two rose to "the top". We can do better than this; we MUST do better than this. Personally I advocate for replacing the House of Representatives with a proportional representation system to encourage the viability and formation of real third party choices. The US stands alone in having the meme "third party" due to the mathematical fact that our system only allows two sides due to our "winner take all" system. These sides often switch platforms, and absorb any emergent 3rd parties within a few election cycles.

Sources:
RT Network
Are foreign nationals covered under the Constitution?
Corporate personhood
First Amendment and “Foreign-Controlled” U.S. Corporations
Can US election hack be traced to Russia?
Putin: Patriotic Russians may be involved in hacking
The Macedonian Teens Who Mastered Fake News
Macedonia’s fake news industry sets sights on Europe
Russian Cyber Attack Repelled During French Elections
Proportional representation

Google "emoluments" for more info. While some claim those laws don't apply to the president, no court has yet ruled on it,

FYI, the arguments that emoluments don't apply in Trump's case are really, really weak.

Basically, using the criteria proposed by Trump's own legal defense counsel (common usage of the term at the time), the definition of emolument is practically any form of payment for practically any reason. Here's an analysis by John Mikhail, professor of law at Georgetown.

Georgetown Law School says you don't know what you're talking about.

http://scholarship.law.georget...

The fact that the Framers chose to limit to citizens only the rights to vote and to run for federal office is one indication that they did not intend other constitutional rights to be so limited.

because it demonstrates a significant lack of appreciation for the text, spirit, or values enshrined in the Constitution

Overall, I find the lack of appreciation for same by the other party to be far more discontenting. It is the Democrats, who wish to:

• Illegalize "hate speech", contrary to the First Amendment;
• Illegalize weapons — from knives and brass knuckles to firearms, contrary to the Second Amendment;
• promote Affirmative Action — contrary to the Fourteenth Amendment;
• abolish Electoral College and otherwise diminish the role of the member-States in the Union;

But those threats to the Constitution do not worry you, only Christianity does?..

the survey you cited includes no evidence that American Muslims agree with Sharia Law

Seriously? Are you that dense? The article I linked to is called (emphasis mine) "Muslims and Islam: Key findings in the U.S. and around the world". What does it tell you, that, while it has Sharia-support figures for about 20 other countries — and even a graphic showing same — the figures for the US are omitted? Ok, maybe, my growing up in the USSR gave me the ability to read between the lines, that the blissfully naive Americans do not possess. Fine. Let's look for other sources:

According to the just-released survey of Muslims, a majority (51%) agreed that “Muslims in America should have the choice of being governed according to shariah.” When that question was put to the broader U.S. population, the overwhelming majority held that shariah should not displace the U.S. Constitution (86% to 2%).

and:

nearly a quarter of the Muslims polled believed that, “It is legitimate to use violence to punish those who give offense to Islam by, for example, portraying the prophet Mohammed.”

Now, these results are politically inconvenient to the still-prevailing dogma, so, as could be expected, the study is denounced (such as here) as "deeply flawed". But what better rebuttal could there be, than offering results of your own study contradicting those of the "flawed" one? And yet, none of the critics could cite their own numbers. Does that not tell you something?

a completely made up story

Once again, it is not "made up" at all — and certainly not completely made up. It is a real problem, and not just in the US (for which we, curiously, do not establishment-blessed figures at all), but also in Canada, UK, and Norway...

Quit denying it — makes you look stupid. You'll get better mileage out of arguing, "it is nothing to worry about" instead.

Thanks Trump!

Don't forget Bush! Obama inherited DEA from his predecessor, didn't he? 8 years of Presidency is not enough to fix a federal law-enforcement agency, especially if you pick Attorney Generals for their Social Justice credentials, rather than the ability to run a sizeable organization. (An ability, Obama himself never had either.)

And, unlike closing Guantanamo, Obama never even promised to reign-in the Drug Enforcement Administration — so we can't hold him responsible for its abuses, can we?

*not the same AC, but he is right

Citation:

Demore V. Kim

Georgetown University Law Center analysis

Short version: The Supreme Court has ruled a number of times that constitutional rights, the right to bear arms and freedom of travel in this discussion, do not extend to non-citizens. Thus, not only the other AC is right in that "We don't have to extend those same rights to foreign nationals." but that we don't extend those rights to non-citizens as a matter of law laid out by the highest court in the country.

USA constitutional rights apply to citizens only.

No. You fail civics,

The Supreme Court has insisted for more than a century that foreign nationals living among us are "persons" within the meaning of the Constitution, and are protected by those rights that the Constitution does not expressly reserve to citizens. The Constitution expressly limits to citizens only the rights to vote and to run for federal elective office.

Here, have a little light reading.

The fourth amendment actually uses the word 'people' and not 'citizens'. In cases where the lawmakers or framers intended the rights to be extended only to 'citizens', they make that explicit (i.e., for voting).

http://scholarship.law.georget...

So, no. Your assertion probably isn't true. But I'm not a lawyer--or even an American!--so my cursory search around the internet isn't worth much. Then again, it appears to be more than you've done...

A vital detail that those outside the city (and many within it) don't know - and of course won't get from the inflammatory OMG! NANNY STATE! headline/summary - is that the City of Seattle doesn't have a local landfill. Hasn't for many years; there's no nearby space. Instead, all garbage is loaded onto train cars - hundreds of them a day - and sent by rail to a landfill in rural Oregon, about 250 miles away. That was the cheapest alternative for the city, even though it involves paying twice (once to transport it, and again to the landfill operator). But it's still expensive. Given that it's in the best interest of the City _and_ its ratepayers to reduce the amount of landfillable waste (aka number of train cars) in favor of more economic alternatives; specifically, recycling and composting, both of which are able to be handled within a few dozen miles of the city, at much lower cost than the landfill trains. The alternative is to have even more and longer trains and higher rates for garbage for everyone. Kind of the opposite of a nanny state; this is pure and simple economics. If the spectre of a few $1 fines for the few residents who can't be bothered to separate their greasy pizza boxes into another bin makes everyone's garbage rates lower, then I'm all for it.

Thats BS. Seattle has no landfill because it doesn't want one. Not because there is no space. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_City_Light
http://faculty.georgetown.edu/...
http://www.economist.com/node/...
(from 2007) http://seattletimes.com/.../20...
(2012) http://your.kingcounty.gov/sol...
OP is referencing this: http://www.seattle.gov/finance...
That's the problem: wastefull goverment mismanagement when they could make a deal with those nearby.

The answer is pretty easy. Eliminate the ability of cities, counties or states to create monopolies. In jurisdictions where there is no monopoly and multiple offerings exist; prices are lower, service is better and customers are more satisfied.
http://www.pcworld.com/article...
http://cbpp.georgetown.edu/wp-...
http://www.uspirg.org/reports/...

I seem to recall some numbers that the differential value of a college degree is actually highest outside of STEM.

I know of no study that has found that. If you google for "value of college degree by major" you will find plenty of references that show STEM degrees are the best investment. This study found that petroleum engineering is the best paying major, and psychology the worst, with other STEM degrees clustered at the top, and other non-STEM degrees clustered at the bottom. The best non-STEM degree is business.

From the author's research page: "His research has received support from the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and the U.S. Department of Defense, among other sources." Irritating, no?

PDF at: http://www9.georgetown.edu/fac...

It wasn't about programming, specifically, but about all computer usage. I hate to summarize, but my take was that only through text can you get down to anything the tool (the computer) can do; with all interfaces, you're limited to what the designer of the interface thought you might do.

Google "Obama Harvard" there are tons of images including from television appearances. There is an interview in 1991 with Frontline which is one of the most prestigious news / documentary programs in the United States.

And if you want someone who remembers him: Robin West who co-authored an article with him. She's real: http://www.law.georgetown.edu/faculty/west-robin-l.cfm

I think you need to legal lesson on the difference between the US and a common law country. Legal precedent means nothing in so much as the law is concerned.

See: WHICH COURT IS BINDING?* - Mandatory vs. Persuasive Cases - Page 4

Anyways, it has made the american people aware of our government's crimes.

Alleged crimes, not in fact. Every time they have been legally adjudicated the NSA's actions have been found legal.

There is a ruling that specifically says their actions are unconstitutional, i.e. violating the highest law of the land.

No. There is a preliminary injunction based on the judge's expectation that he will find for the complainant, but it is suspended for appeal. Even if he does decide that way the judgment will have to survive appeal. There are problems with his ruling as seen by law professors, and precedent is against him.

We agree that this will probably end up in the Supreme Court at some point. The most likely outcome is one consistent with previous cases.

Uniform Commercial Code, while not law itself, which has been incorporated into the laws of most US states, disagrees with you. That link is for Ohio, just one of many states which have incorporated UCC into its laws; see also: Maine, South Carolina, Nebraska, and Google, if you care for a more complete list (HINT: Louisiana is the only state that has not adopted UCC article 2, which applies here).

For our next trick, we shall make one vehicle that runs on two and four wheels, flies, floats, submerges, is sporty, family friendly, industrial strength, cheap, luxurious, compact, roomy ... Provided missing car analogy.

Neal Stephenson already provided one (page 3) in 1999, which kinda reminded me of your statement:

With one exception, that is: Linux, which is right next door, and which is not a
business at all. It’s a bunch of RVs, yurts, tepees, and geodesic domes set up in a field
and organized by consensus. The people who live there are making tanks. These are
not old-fashioned, cast-iron Soviet tanks; these are more like the M1 tanks of the U.S.
Army, made of space-age materials and jammed with sophisticated technology from
one end to the other. But they are better than Army tanks. They’ve been modified in
such a way that they never, ever break down, are light and maneuverable enough to
use on ordinary streets, and use no more fuel than a subcompact car. These tanks are
being cranked out, on the spot, at a terrific pace, and a vast number of them are lined
up along the edge of the road with keys in the ignition. Anyone who wants can simply
climb into one and drive it away for free.

"In The Beginning was the Command Line" is a bit dated now, but it is an amusing read nonetheless.

All of Thurgood Marshall's former clerks are conservatives? Right wingers, Birchers and clansmen; the whole lot?

http://www.law.georgetown.edu/faculty/seidman-louis-michael.cfm#

No doubt a NRA and GOA life member!

In general, the US constitution protects all people within the US, not just citizens. Although there are some differences.
Detailed academic discussion here:
http://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1302&context=facpub [georgetown.edu]

Yeah, you could read a bunch of smoke blown by lawyers or other low lives. Or you could just, like, I don't know, read the first amendment for yourself. It's written in plain language and is extremely brief.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Hmmm, it talks about "the people", not "citizens". And it talks about about "no law", not "no law that affects specifically citizens". I'd say it's pretty obvious.

In fact the entire constitution is short (4400 words) and very readable. All the constitutions I've seen are in plain language. The 1977 version of the constitution of the USSR was pretty long and detailed, but it was plain enough. In fact it contained something sadly lacking the US constitution that could have saved an enormous number of lives in 1861. It expressly recognized that the individual constituent republics could secede; hence the breakup of the USSR was practically bloodless. Lack of that explicit language in the US constitution meant a single tyrant was able to butcher about 600,000 of his own fellow citizens.

The US Constitution only protects US citizens.

In general, the US constitution protects all people within the US, not just citizens. Although there are some differences.
Detailed academic discussion here:
http://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1302&context=facpub

Although GEB can be an entertaining book, I don't think a course that had GEB as reading material was what the original writer had in mind for a prototypical humanities course***.

*** yes, I know there have been university courses built around GEB, but there have been university philosophy courses built around star trek too

Happens all the time. Generally, they say it pays off, but your major does matter. I do tend to agree with you as I think it matters how much it costs the student. Here is one from Georgetown University: http://www9.georgetown.edu/grad/gppi/hpi/cew/pdfs/whatsitworth-complete.pdf

http://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1302&context=facpub (PDF)

I'm going to quote a long chunk from that, but the point is at the end, so you may want to skip to that.

Are foreign nationals entitled only to reduced rights and freedoms? The difficulty of the question is reflected in the deeply ambivalent approach of the Supreme Court, an ambivalence matched only by the alternately xenophobic and xenophilic attitude of the American public toward immigrants. On the one hand, the Court has insisted for more than a century that foreign nationals living among us are "persons" within the meaning of the Constitution, and are protected by those rights that the Constitution does not expressly reserve to citizens. Because the Constitution expressly limits to citizens only the rights to vote and to run for federal elective office, equality between non-nationals and citizens would appear to be the constitutional rule.

On the other hand, the Court has permitted foreign nationals to be excluded and expelled because of their race. It has allowed them to be deported for political associations that were entirely lawful at the time they were engaged in? It has upheld laws barring foreign nationals from owning land, even where the laws were a transparent cover for anti-Japanese racism. It has permitted the indefinite detention of "arriving aliens" stopped at the border on the basis of secret evidence that they could not confront. And it has allowed states to bar otherwise qualified foreign nationals from employment as public school teachers and police officers, based solely on their status as foreigners.

Given this record, it is not surprising that many members of the general public presume that noncitizens do not deserve the same rights as citizens. But the presumption is wrong in many more respects than it is right. While some distinctions between foreign nationals and citizens are normatively justified and consistent with constitutional and international law, most are not. The significance of the citizen/noncitizen distinction is more often presumed than carefully examined. Upon examination, there is far less to the distinction than commonly thought. In particular, foreign nationals are generally entitled to the equal protection of the laws, to political freedoms of speech and association, and to due process requirements of fair procedure where their lives, liberty, or property are at stake.

1. ALIENS, CITIZENS, AND CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS

The Constitution does distinguish in some respects between the rights of citizens and noncitizens: the right not to be discriminatorily denied the vote and the right to run for federal elective office are expressly restricted to citizens. All other rights, however, are written without such a limitation. The Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment due process and equal protection guarantees extend to all "persons." The rights attaching to criminal trials, including the right to a public trial, a trial by jury, the assistance of a lawyer, and the right to confront adverse witnesses, all apply to "the accused." And both the First Amendment's protections of political and religious freedoms and the Fourth Amendment's protection of privacy and liberty apply to "the people."

The fact that the Framers chose to limit to citizens only the rights to vote and to run for federal office is one indication that they did not intend other constitutional rights to be so limited.

Accordingly, the Supreme Court has squarely stated that neither the First Amendment nor the Fifth Amendment "acknowledges any distinction between citizens and resident aliens." For more than a century, the Court has recognized that the Equal Protection Clause is "universal in [its] application, to all persons within the territorial jurisdiction, without regard to differences of ...
nationality."

The Court has repeatedly stated th

For the record, initial media reports called her a 23 year old undergraduate senior. Being 30 disqualifies her from being 23. "They are lying to make her seem more sympathetic" where "they" means either her, her Democrat handlers, or the media doing the reporting is probably what you saw.

I've searched and searched and found no reports that she is 23. I found many, many articles claiming she was reported to be 23, but not one of them mentions a source for that claim. Oddly, many of them do quote from http://www.law.georgetown.edu/pils/CurrentPILS.htm where it is stated that Fluke received a BS from Cornell in 2003. Considering its presence on that page, there's clearly been no attempt to hide that info. So, according to these articles, the media's initial reporting implied that she graduated from Cornell when she was 14. That's a little silly. Perhaps someone said she was 23 at some point, but one act of incompetence does not a conspiracy make. Also, I've seen no evidence that she herself claimed to be 23. She has, however, stated that she is 30. If her "handlers" were really trying to make people believe she was 23, they should have mentioned the plan to her so she could help out.

part of her testimony was that she was "shocked" to find out (while already a student) that her Georgetown health insurance didn't cover birth control. Since she has said she went to Georgetown SPECIFICALLY to challenge this policy, that means that she lied in her press conference.

First off, testifying in front of Congress is not the same as a press conference. Second, I've read (and searched) her testimony. The word shocked is nowhere to be found. Either you are lying (and bad at it!) or you haven't done the slightest research (i.e., reading/viewing her testimony) and are just blindly repeating the lies of others.

She graduated from her undergraduate school at 22 with a degree in Gender Studies. She then used that degree to become a paid lobbyist for liberal pro-abortion and pro-government paying for birth control groups. At this point, she was a professional activist. Then she went to Georgetown to challenge this policy and get a law degree. Presumably she will continue in the field of professional activism for liberal causes once she graduates. Is her old job paying for the degree? I don't know. I know that the company I work for has a tuition repayment program, so it's entirely possible, and not even that shady.

Oh, so she's a "plant" because she's been a professional activist in addition to being a student. By your definition, almost every politician in Washington is a "plant". How exactly is it that being committed enough to her cause to get paid for it nullifies her points?

Seriously, though, you've never bought birth control? In the circles I travel in, a guy is a douche (and probably also a moron asking for drama) if he doesn't provide his own condoms.

Nice, a red herring and an ad hominem at the same time. You get double logical fallacy bonus points! We haven't been talking about condoms -- we've been talking about hormonal birth control.

Fluke said it would cost $3000 over her law school career, which is a lie.

Once again, if you had bothered to read her testimony you would know that isn't true. She said "Without insurance coverage, contraception can cost a woman over $3,000 during law school." That statement points out that $3000 is the maximum cost. You are talking like she said it is the minimum cost. And I'm supposed to believe she is the liar?

I've heard it reported that Georgetown's insurance covers "off-label" use of birth control (i.e. to treat a disease and not just for contraception.) Most of what Fluke said in her press conference is provably misleading or an outright lie. Because it's Fluke talking about "a friend of hers" and not giv

I really like this bit of word recognition:

"Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteers be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe."

http://explore.georgetown.edu/news/?ID=60788&PageTemplateID=295

Actually, here's a better explanation:

Stratospheric ozone blocks UV, which is good for animals and plants because sunburns and skin cancer are dependent on the energy in each photon, which is inversely proportional to the photon's wavelength. Because UV has a shorter wavelength than visible light, each UV photon individually has enough energy to break the chemical bonds in our DNA.

Thermodynamic effects, though, are dependent on the total energy in all the photons summed together. So when I say that ozone's radiative forcing (i.e. global warming effects) are small, that's because sunlight has less UV than visible light. Ozone's absorption of UV can warm the stratosphere, but only because of its low heat capacity.

They you say that the ozone is important because it blocks UV (and mention sunburns). But elsewhere you say that it has little effect on surface temperature (which logically would imply that UV strong enough to cause sunburns would have little effect on surface temperature).

Stratospheric ozone blocks UV, which is important for animals and plants. Its radiative forcing (i.e. global warming effects) are small, though. That's because sunlight has less UV than visible light. Ozone's absorption of UV can warm the stratosphere, but only because of its low heat capacity.

Again, ozone's radiative forcing at the surface is much, much smaller than CO2. In fact, notice that the error bars on stratospheric ozone actually lie on both the positive and negative sides of the forcings chart, implying that modern science can't distinguish its effect from "zero".

... the sole point I have been trying to make is that none of the mainstream models account for the phenomena observed here, whether that be ozone recovery or just the temperature trend.

The prediction of ozone recovery isn't the province of GCMs. As I said, that's a forcing, not a part of the model. And it's believed to be happening because of the ban on CFCs.

Strangely enough, I've been agreeing with your "sole point" about the temperature trends for weeks:

"In contrast, stratospheric temperature trends aren't as well understood."

"Yet again, I'm saying that stratospheric trends aren't as well understood as surface trends ..."

And in this post I agreed with that claim.

But, as I said at the end of this comment, I must have gotten the wrong impression about your sole point from previous comments. Like I said at the end of that post, my bad. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to misinterpret your position as though you were trying to use this paper to demonstrate that GCMs are fundamentally flawed. That's completely my mistake, and I'd like to apologize once more.

And I object in the strongest terms to the use of the word "fraudulent". That is going much too far. I don't care a whit if you disagree with me, but if you have any evidence of fraud on my part, I challenge you to present it right now. I don't know who the hell you think you are, but you won't get away with that kind of garbage.

I didn't mean that you were engaging in fraud. I meant that your description of this "bristlecone pine" situation clearly implies that you think scientists are either ridiculously incompetent or literally faking their data (i.e. fraudulent). Isn't that what you were saying?

This statement is just yet another of your many disingenuous remarks. I have already explained to which papers I refer, and if you cannot make some small logical inferences about exactly which papers I mean, then I question your ability to do it about anything else. ... In fact, I find their methods far more convincing, in a statistical sense, than those used to develop the HadCRUT3 dataset. If you have reservations about THIS satellite data, then why don't you have reservations about other data that is statistically weaker? I have asked you this several times, in different ways, and you have ignored me every time.

If by "ignore" you mean that I've asked you to show me the faulty papers in question, yeah. Please note that I'm not telepathic, so I don't know what paper you're talking about. Yes, this means I'm too stupid to do research. I understand that you think I'm an idiot or a conspirator, so there's not much point in repeating that stateme

But you are incorrect that they did it for intel, since that is also not possible.

Where's the study or even a valid argument supporting this claim.

Ok. Studies and reports on them:

http://explore.georgetown.edu/news/?ID=20647
http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/519416/
http://www.talkleft.com/story/2009/9/21/21847/9403
http://www.popsci.com/military-aviation-amp-space/article/2009-09/new-study-finds-torture-negatively-affects-memory

And further valid arguments supporting those claims:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30721458/print/1/displaymode/1098/
http://dissidentvoice.org/2009/04/torture-is-more-than-just-harsh-tactics/
http://www.oppapers.com/essays/Dbq-Usefulness-Torture/132993

And at least one example of how this is a slippery slope that leads to nothing good:
  http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/arar/
If nothing else, please Please read about this person!

Do further googles (or wiki searches) for Maher Arar
Then just keep in mind there is NOTHING at all that happened nor will happen that would prevent you or anyone else you know from being in that persons shoes, by a random throw of the dice.

Sure that is an extreme case, but it is cases like that where I can honestly say I would support the usage. If anything, allowing these terrorists to come to a US Court sets a precedent where the usage of information gathered by torture becomes acceptable in a criminal investigation.

That is until they* come into your home at night, haul you and your wife/gf/S.O./whatever away to different prisons in another country and torture you for your terrorists connections for 9 months.
You are doing exactly everything required to qualify as a terrorist suspect under our current methods of determining who is or could be a terrorist, so it is not at all as far fetched as your extreme example is.

[*] They being all of the sociopaths that work their way into positions of power and dominance due to their personality requiring it, whom you are willingly and gladly giving permission to torture anyone and everyone (since that is our current definition of terrorist suspect)

Indeed

Basically:

The ideal warm-weather windshield: reflects UV (and anything higher), transmits visible, reflects near-IR, and transmits mid/far-IR.
The ideal cold-weather windshield: reflects UV (and anything higher), transmits visible, transmits near-IR, and reflects mid/far-IR.
The ideal general-purpose windshield: reflects UV (and anything higher), transmits visible, reflects near-IR, and reflects mid/far-IR.

UV: Generally bad. Not much heat (and needed for vitamin D synthesis) but causes skin cancer and ages many (if not most) materials.
Visible: What you can see. Obviously, you want as much of this as you can.
Near-IR: A significant amount of solar energy that you can't see but will still heat up your car significantly.
Mid/far-IR: Heat radiating from surfaces on Earth (i.e., the inside of your car losing heat)

"Does wiretapping make us more secure."

Define your terms and perhaps you can begin to address the question. And if you acknowledge that the world is a complex place, then perhaps you'll even be willing admit that the simplicity of this question is ridiculous.

I'm shocked that I've found little commentary from you Slash.erers about the egregious abuse of power from WWII up through the 1970's that led to the Federal Information Security Act (FISA). Essentially, the Intelligence 'Community' refused to give up the use of their information gathering tools, even though their use, in the absence of reasonable suspicion and court approval, was ILLEGAL. Surveillance was rampant and it's not like it protected us from the Mob during that time, unless you think redirecting the Mafia against Castro during the Bay of Pigs fiasco did anyone any favors.

Since then communications technology has changed and the methods and techniques use in surveillance has been improved along with it. So has the opportunity for its abuse. The Bush administration took this to new heights and used FUD in ways that make Microsoft look like a schoolyard wimp. If you want a good read on the topic at hand, from a legal scholar, a concerned citizen and recipient of numerous awards for his efforts to provide advice and counsel on liberty and freedom of expression, read Justice at War: The Men and Ideas that Shaped America's War on Terror by David D. Cole. Once you've read this work, then you might be able to reframe the question in a more historically grounded discussion regarding the nature of what it means to "make us secure" why it might be necessary, and from whom.

When you are done reading this http://www8.georgetown.edu/departments/medieval/labyrinth/library/oe/texts/a4.1.html

Remind yourself that the English language changes before your next rant...

Yea, evribodi nose dat.

When you are done reading this http://www8.georgetown.edu/departments/medieval/labyrinth/library/oe/texts/a4.1.html

Remind yourself that the English language changes before your next rant...

He also took on the Bush administration for the right to report from the battlefield after they went against 200yrs of journalistic tradition and made it illeagal at the start of the Afghan war, he set another important precedent by winning that one too.

You're talking about Flynt v. Rumsfeld. He lost that one.

The sun is a strong source of near-IR. It's not a very good source of far-IR. Image.

The 110th Congress Composition: 282 Democrats - 274 Republicans - 2 Independents. So please tell me how Republicans created this mess?

Congress no longer does anything but produce pieces of paper upon which the US President will scrawl his latest edicts.

They are simply a vestige of the former Republic, like the Roman Senate under Caligula. Purely decorative, or at most whipping boys to placate the masses.

According to US law, it is a license (and because of the lack of consideration, it couldn't possibly be a contract).

Check out McCoy v Mitsuboshi Cutlery, where the court held: 'Whether express or implied, a license is a contract "governed by ordinary principles of state contract law."'

There's an old saying among lawyers - something isn't so until a judge says it is. Well, a judge said this was so.

Not really. First off, you don't plead guilty in civil cases such as this. Second, courts have held (see, e.g., Scosche v. Visor Gear) that Rule 68 judgments do not have a preclusive effect on litigating issues they dispose of. Therefore, the RIAA probably cannot take the Rule 68-based judgment and use it against this defendant in a future case to avoid actually litigating the issues in the future case. Numerous sources indicate that Rule 68 has the sole purpose of encouraging settlement.

Finally, the real issue that was raised and to which I responded: There is no precedential effect, no matter how you take the Rule 68-based judgment. Legal precedents are only as to issues of law. It seems that no interpretation of law was made here, and any issues that were disposed of by the judgment are factual in nature. There is no such thing as a legally binding factual precedent.

Eolas v. Microsoft, 399 F.3d 1325 (Fed. Cir. 2005). Page 24 of the PDF. I quote:

Without question, software code alone qualifies as an invention eligible for patenting under these categories, at least as processes. See In re Alappat, 33 F.3d 1526 (Fed. Cir. 1994); AT&T Corp. v. Excel Communications, Inc., 172 F.3d 1352 (Fed. Cir. 1999); MPEP 2106.IV.B.1.a. (8th ed., rev. 2 2001).

The Supreme Court hasn't directly said software alone is patentable, but they've explicitly said they're not ruling it out (until they get a case where they have to decide it to reach a conclusion). In other words, the Federal Circuit's law is correct (for now). Here's the quote from Diamond v. Diehr, 450 U.S. 175 (1981):

Our earlier opinions lend support to our present conclusion that a claim drawn to subject matter otherwise statutory does not become nonstatutory simply because it uses a mathematical formula, computer program, or digital computer. In Gottschalk v. Benson we noted: "It is said that the decision precludes a patent for any program servicing a computer. We do not so hold." 409 U.S., at 71. Similarly, in Parker v. Flook we stated that "a process is not unpatentable simply because it contains a law of nature or a mathematical algorithm." 437 U.S., at 590. It is now commonplace that an application of a law of nature or mathematical formula to a known structure or process may well be deserving of patent protection. See, e. g., Funk Bros. Seed Co. v. Kalo Inoculant Co., 333 U.S. 127 (1948); Eibel Process Co. v. Minnesota & Ontario Paper Co., 261 U.S. 45 (1923); Cochrane v. Deener, 94 U.S. 780 (1877); O'Reilly v. Morse, 15 How. 62 (1854); and Le Roy v. Tatham, 14 How. 156 (1853).

Until and unless Congress changes their mind or the Supreme Court says otherwise, software IS patentable.

In lessthan two years, magnetic storage will sit aside vacuum tubes and punch cards in the Computing wing at Smithsonian.

Yeah, that's why we don't have any idea what anybody might have said (or meant) more than a thousand years ago.

I very quickly summarized the commentary here on why one would move from the US to several flamewars based on a lack of understanding of the culture in various non-US countries to arguments about tax burdens and arguments about what constitutes an addictive drug.

These are side-issues.

The reson one might be interested in leaving the US relates to something that my father shocked me by saying just some weeks ago.

He referred to the current administration in the US, along with their supporters in Congress at fascists.

Now, I respect my father. I'm not just out of his house and I'm not still reacting to the "awful way he treated me" when I "turned insane" shortly after puberty. My father has consistently earned my respect by tending to be right and by letting go of a lot of his own personal garbage. I also know that he lived through a time in which fascism was considered a viable political system in three countries in Europe -- with other countries admiring the "benefits" of a totalitarian regime that gives itself a pass for criminal activity. This is a serious and very shocking statement from a man who watched as the entire world fought against fascism and managed to win.

The US government is fascist due to several factors:

The Military Commissions Act of 2006(PDF Alert), which was signed by Bush on October 17, 2006 suspends the writ of Habeus Corpus in a time that is definitely not a national emergency.

This preserves the "Law-Free Zone" set up in Guantanimo. These detainees are kept in isolation from US Courts who, if there is adequate proof would be all too happy to confirm that these people are dangerous. Camp X-Ray also serves as a zone where the Geneva Conventions on the treatment of Prisoners of War may be utterly ignored. We broke off relations with North Vietnam (and later, Vietnam) due to their treatment of US prisoners in a manner that ignored the Geneva Conventions.

The act also pardons everyone and anyone for all acts that violate the Geneva Conventions, including the procedure of Extraordinary Rendition and backdates that exemption from prosecution to September 11th, 2001.

The President and his Executive Branch are given full reign in defining what an "enemy combatant" is. I recall that Hitler regarded Jewish persons within Germany and the territories acquired by Germany, as well as allied countries as enemies of the state. Also, anyone giving material aid to any enemy was branded with the same. There was no Habeus Corpus in Germany and the courts were puppets of the state.

What I'm saying here is that we have a very serious situation in the US where civil rights have been nullified by a political party that considers self-examination wrong and unpatriotic (there have been no committees in either the House of Representatives or the Senate to examine the conduct of the "war on terror") and are fully prepared to negate the entire Bill of Rights in order to maintain their grip on political power.

Many Americans aren't aware of how their rights have been suspended. Those who are find it hard to continue to live here.

Countries who honor the rights of their citizens and who do not give their executive branch the right to run roughshod over the rights of minorities and persons who hold political beliefs that may differ may look a lot better than the US today for a citizen concerned with our present government.

Since when are business models subject to patent rights?

Up until 1998, business methods were thought to be so called unstatutory subject matter, meaning that the laws governing patents did not allow for business methods to be patented. However, in State Street Bank & Trust Company v. Signature Financial Group, Inc., 149 F.3d 1368 (Fed. Cir. 1998), the court found:

Since the 1952 Patent Act, business methods have been, and should have been, subject to the same legal requirements for patentability as applied to any other process or method.

Since then business method patents have become very common in the US and around the world.