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I'm going to be a pedantic ass and point out that there are cases of cancer being contagious.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

It's far from common in humans but other species it can be quite common and spread like a plague.

Like I said, I'm picking nits here. Ignore me if you like.

Increased to the point of functional immunity for all intents and purposes.

This depends on both the disease and the patient.

Some vaccines confer nearly 100% immunity. MMR is 97% effective against measles. The smallpox vaccine was also nearly 100% effective.

Other vaccines are much less effective. Influenza vaccines are estimated to be about 40% effective, and its primary benefit is keeping R0 well below one, so that the disease does not spread through the herd.

Do I get to choose what to inject into you?
Does Donald Trump choose what gets injected into you?

Blacks in Tuskegee learned the hard way that you can't trust the government "Public Health" services when they want to inject stuff into you.

"Cancer isn't contagious. Unlike stupidity."

You've heard of oncoviruses, yes?
An oncovirus is a virus that can cause cancer.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

But it's not as contagious as that stupidity virus you seem to suffer from.

This has been subject to lots of prior considerations - see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

... of those who contract measles, and their insurance fees should reflect that added risk.

Only by making the costs or either decision transparent, you can address both the unfounded and the founded fears of vaccinations risks versus non-vaccinations risks.

While the benefit of the measles vaccination seems obvious to most, actual scandals surrounding other vaccinations have cast shadows of doubt on just every vaccination, especially for those who do not differentiate.

One tragic contemporary example:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world... /
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Species_concept

No, they don't.

That aside, per basic epistemology (e.g. Aristotle), there is a justification for a separate category for an entity when there's a unique characteristic differentiating that entity from all other entities.

I'm going with "I have a soul" as my non-optional differentiating characteristic, as the most cursory analysis demonstrates there is no biological differentiator for the arbitrary distinctions between "hominids". Regardless of how many scientists subscribe to an arbitrary DNA division naming, and regardless if they try to non-sequitur philosophical gravitas by mimicking Latin naming conventions.

The rest of you hominids and general animals who reject "soul", can propose your own.

Spoiler alert: There isn't one, and if you claim you have, say, "rights" and Koko the gorilla doesn't, your stance is philosophically incoherent and you are deeply irrational on a profoundly fundamental level. At least you have a lot of company--with the rest of the secular Left.

Evolution will fix you when you inevitably get naturally deselected though. Keep the "faith"!

Live by the sword, die by the sword. However, I do not think they envisioned Microsoft Seppuku. ;)

720x480, 858x480 is well outside of broadcast-safe

Frame rate and resolution do matter when speaking of definition.

720P is HD Ready by all official accounts. If you don't like the "HD" moniker, than invent a new one. HD is already clearly defined by industry.

Your 25 years ago self was probably not able to watch full resolution broadcasts on your so-called superior system. Gotta say you're comparing apples to oranges here.

America is the greatest example of how poor people can become very rich through hard work and honesty. There is massive economic mobility,

No it's literally not and no there literally isn't.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

While a few people (Bezos, Gates, Zuckerberg) can make out like the bandits that they are social mobility is not that high. Much, much much worse than you excessively polite Northern neighbour.

largest predictor of success being 1) whether you have both parents at the home, 2) how hard you're willing to work and 3) whether or not your parents are criminals.

You missed out the "your parents are rich" part which goes at the head of the list and dwarfs the other three.

The best life choice you can ever ever make is to be born rich. Especially in America (and the UK, my country. which is apparently slightly worse. Oh well I'm sure Brexit will improve that lolololol ).

You should look it up. Amongst the developed nations, America is actually one of the worst. Basically, Americans are most likely to earn the same income as their parents. The income mobility is largely myth based on a few successes. You do do better then the UK though.
To quote https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

However a more recent paper (2007) found a person's parents is a great deal more predictive of their own income in the United States than other countries.[7] The United States had about 1/3 the ratio of mobility of Denmark and less than half that of Canada, Finland and Norway.[3] France, Germany, Sweden, also had higher mobility, with only the United Kingdom being less mobile.[3]

and

Economic mobility is everywhere correlated with income and wealth inequality.[16][17]

Going AC for this post for reasons...

There are of course shades (inappropriate pun intended) of racism. On one extreme there are the genocidal racists. Then you have those who just make assumptions based on race.

I've been guilty of this when I was younger. My exposure to black people consisted of 4 people, 2 students in my class and our maid and our lawn guy. They were hard-working and the students were intelligent, but I viewed these 4 examples of black people as exceptions, which I have now come to believe was wrong.

Since then I have met many more people of all races and I've seen examples of hard-working, intelligent humans and I've also seen those who I would consider the scum of the earth. I don't see a whole lot of correlation to so-called "race".

And you also have to take into account socio-economic factors. When everyone expects you to be a criminal, lazy or stupid one might tend to live down to those expectations. If black Americans seem less educated, it might have something to do with the shitty schools we send them to. If Asian people seem smarter, it just may be that only the privileged and/or smart ones get to come over, at least for the most part.

I've been slumming around the Fox News comments section way too much lately and the racism is so blatant I can't believe no one calls them out for it.

When Jayme Closs escaped her kidnapper, it took nearly a day for the cops to release the name and picture of her assailant. During that time the big question on 90% of the commenters minds was whether he was black or an illegal immigrant or Mexican.

Oops, he was white.

And when 4 cops were shot executing a warrant in Houston the same thing happened. They said the reason they haven't announced the suspect's names or pictures was obviously because they were black or Mexican (which is of course a term they use for anyone with a Spanish-sounding name, even people from Italy). And again all they could agree on is it had to be one or the other.

Of course the reason the names were not immediately released is because 4 cops had just been shot and they were trying to investigate everything and figure out just exactly happened while 4 of them who were there were lying in the hospital.

And once again the suspects were white.

I'm white and I'm sick of racists. Can you imagine how black people feel?

-----

Oh, and remember last year when Trump said it's "a very scary time for young men in America"?

Did everyone forget how Trump reacted to the Central Park Five?

To summarize a woman was brutally assaulted in 1989 and 4 blacks and one Hispanic were convicted despite very shaky evidence. Trump took out full page ads before the trial proclaiming them guilty and calling for the reinstatement of the death penalty.

Based on DNA evidence and a confession from someone else their sentences were vacated in 2002 and yet Trump still kept proclaiming their guilt as recently as 2016.

What he REALLY meant was "It's a scary time for WHITE males who might actually have to suffer the same kind of injustices that we've put minorities through for all of our history. MAGA!!!!!"

More speculation and no data. Try again. With data this time.

No, there are enough key words to overcome your alloplastic reasoning.

You don't care about data, all you care about is being as frustrating and annoying as possible so that people express that and you claim some moral superiority that somehow makes you "right".

It is clear you don't even care about nuclear power, it's just what you use to get whatever emotional reactions you seek from people because people have very polarized opinions on the subject. You project your troll mannerisms onto others with your techniques so you can claim they are trolls. You're skilled at it and I suggest that anyone who reads this is going to recognize what you do instantly.

Nuclear power is safer than anything else. We have the data. Show me otherwise.

Sure.
Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster
Chernobyl nuclear disaster
Windscale nuclear fire
Three_Mile_Island_accident

All INES 5 or greater nuclear disasters. If you claim they did no harm, prove it and go to Fukushima and help with the cleanup. I hear properties in the area are being given away. Prove that nuclear is safe by going to Fukushima reactor sites otherwise you are saying that nuclear has no place in our energy supply.

The existence of the Price Anderson Act "proves" nothing. If it's there then nuclear power is "proven" unsafe.

Yes, it is there and yes it proves that nuclear power is unsafe.

If we make attempts to repeal it then the nuclear industry is "proving" it does not care for the public and would leave people homeless and penniless in the case of an accident.

You are so manipulative with your appeal to authority designed to produce an emotional reaction. Anyone who reacts to your subtle troll is called a troll and anyone who argues your point you continue to play your will full ignorance until they give up.

Repealing the P.A act simply means the most dangerous NPPs, like Indian Point and Palo Verde shut down immediately. Then the rest of them progressively close down because their insurance regimen is bought into line with the conditions the rest of industry.

After that there is a massive jobs boom as existing NPPs turbines are converted to natural gas and all of the energy subsidies previously required to keep the nuclear industry afloat are diverted into advancing massive wind, solar and geothermal energy projects.

Nuclear power is keeping America, and many other countries, in poverty because the nuclear industry cares more about existing than whether it is contributing to the public good. Shutting down Nuclear would create the largest economic boom we have seen in our lifetimes.

The only thing the existence of Price Anderson proves is that federal programs are the closest things we have to immortality, once created they never die, even if their need has long since passed.

Then lobby to have it removed. You say Nuclear is the safest thing ever, prove it. Your own reasoning suggests the PA act is not necessary, so commit to your own argument and lobby to repeal the Price Anderson Act because if you don't it just proves that *everything* you say is a complete fabrication designed to frustrate people who simply cannot fathom how deliberately and willfully ignorant you are determined to be.

If you don't argue for removal of the unnecessary Price Anderson Act then it proves all of your posts are a construct to annoy and frustrate people.

More speculation and no data. Try again. With data this time.

No, there are enough key words to overcome your alloplastic reasoning.

You don't care about data, all you care about is being as frustrating and annoying as possible so that people express that and you claim some moral superiority that somehow makes you "right".

It is clear you don't even care about nuclear power, it's just what you use to get whatever emotional reactions you seek from people because people have very polarized opinions on the subject. You project your troll mannerisms onto others with your techniques so you can claim they are trolls. You're skilled at it and I suggest that anyone who reads this is going to recognize what you do instantly.

Nuclear power is safer than anything else. We have the data. Show me otherwise.

Sure.
Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster
Chernobyl nuclear disaster
Windscale nuclear fire
Three_Mile_Island_accident

All INES 5 or greater nuclear disasters. If you claim they did no harm, prove it and go to Fukushima and help with the cleanup. I hear properties in the area are being given away. Prove that nuclear is safe by going to Fukushima reactor sites otherwise you are saying that nuclear has no place in our energy supply.

The existence of the Price Anderson Act "proves" nothing. If it's there then nuclear power is "proven" unsafe.

Yes, it is there and yes it proves that nuclear power is unsafe.

If we make attempts to repeal it then the nuclear industry is "proving" it does not care for the public and would leave people homeless and penniless in the case of an accident.

You are so manipulative with your appeal to authority designed to produce an emotional reaction. Anyone who reacts to your subtle troll is called a troll and anyone who argues your point you continue to play your will full ignorance until they give up.

Repealing the P.A act simply means the most dangerous NPPs, like Indian Point and Palo Verde shut down immediately. Then the rest of them progressively close down because their insurance regimen is bought into line with the conditions the rest of industry.

After that there is a massive jobs boom as existing NPPs turbines are converted to natural gas and all of the energy subsidies previously required to keep the nuclear industry afloat are diverted into advancing massive wind, solar and geothermal energy projects.

Nuclear power is keeping America, and many other countries, in poverty because the nuclear industry cares more about existing than whether it is contributing to the public good. Shutting down Nuclear would create the largest economic boom we have seen in our lifetimes.

The only thing the existence of Price Anderson proves is that federal programs are the closest things we have to immortality, once created they never die, even if their need has long since passed.

Then lobby to have it removed. You say Nuclear is the safest thing ever, prove it. Your own reasoning suggests the PA act is not necessary, so commit to your own argument and lobby to repeal the Price Anderson Act because if you don't it just proves that *everything* you say is a complete fabrication designed to frustrate people who simply cannot fathom how deliberately and willfully ignorant you are determined to be.

If you don't argue for removal of the unnecessary Price Anderson Act then it proves all of your posts are a construct to annoy and frustrate people.

More speculation and no data. Try again. With data this time.

No, there are enough key words to overcome your alloplastic reasoning.

You don't care about data, all you care about is being as frustrating and annoying as possible so that people express that and you claim some moral superiority that somehow makes you "right".

It is clear you don't even care about nuclear power, it's just what you use to get whatever emotional reactions you seek from people because people have very polarized opinions on the subject. You project your troll mannerisms onto others with your techniques so you can claim they are trolls. You're skilled at it and I suggest that anyone who reads this is going to recognize what you do instantly.

Nuclear power is safer than anything else. We have the data. Show me otherwise.

Sure.
Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster
Chernobyl nuclear disaster
Windscale nuclear fire
Three_Mile_Island_accident

All INES 5 or greater nuclear disasters. If you claim they did no harm, prove it and go to Fukushima and help with the cleanup. I hear properties in the area are being given away. Prove that nuclear is safe by going to Fukushima reactor sites otherwise you are saying that nuclear has no place in our energy supply.

The existence of the Price Anderson Act "proves" nothing. If it's there then nuclear power is "proven" unsafe.

Yes, it is there and yes it proves that nuclear power is unsafe.

If we make attempts to repeal it then the nuclear industry is "proving" it does not care for the public and would leave people homeless and penniless in the case of an accident.

You are so manipulative with your appeal to authority designed to produce an emotional reaction. Anyone who reacts to your subtle troll is called a troll and anyone who argues your point you continue to play your will full ignorance until they give up.

Repealing the P.A act simply means the most dangerous NPPs, like Indian Point and Palo Verde shut down immediately. Then the rest of them progressively close down because their insurance regimen is bought into line with the conditions the rest of industry.

After that there is a massive jobs boom as existing NPPs turbines are converted to natural gas and all of the energy subsidies previously required to keep the nuclear industry afloat are diverted into advancing massive wind, solar and geothermal energy projects.

Nuclear power is keeping America, and many other countries, in poverty because the nuclear industry cares more about existing than whether it is contributing to the public good. Shutting down Nuclear would create the largest economic boom we have seen in our lifetimes.

The only thing the existence of Price Anderson proves is that federal programs are the closest things we have to immortality, once created they never die, even if their need has long since passed.

Then lobby to have it removed. You say Nuclear is the safest thing ever, prove it. Your own reasoning suggests the PA act is not necessary, so commit to your own argument and lobby to repeal the Price Anderson Act because if you don't it just proves that *everything* you say is a complete fabrication designed to frustrate people who simply cannot fathom how deliberately and willfully ignorant you are determined to be.

If you don't argue for removal of the unnecessary Price Anderson Act then it proves all of your posts are a construct to annoy and frustrate people.

More speculation and no data. Try again. With data this time.

No, there are enough key words to overcome your alloplastic reasoning.

You don't care about data, all you care about is being as frustrating and annoying as possible so that people express that and you claim some moral superiority that somehow makes you "right".

It is clear you don't even care about nuclear power, it's just what you use to get whatever emotional reactions you seek from people because people have very polarized opinions on the subject. You project your troll mannerisms onto others with your techniques so you can claim they are trolls. You're skilled at it and I suggest that anyone who reads this is going to recognize what you do instantly.

Nuclear power is safer than anything else. We have the data. Show me otherwise.

Sure.
Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster
Chernobyl nuclear disaster
Windscale nuclear fire
Three_Mile_Island_accident

All INES 5 or greater nuclear disasters. If you claim they did no harm, prove it and go to Fukushima and help with the cleanup. I hear properties in the area are being given away. Prove that nuclear is safe by going to Fukushima reactor sites otherwise you are saying that nuclear has no place in our energy supply.

The existence of the Price Anderson Act "proves" nothing. If it's there then nuclear power is "proven" unsafe.

Yes, it is there and yes it proves that nuclear power is unsafe.

If we make attempts to repeal it then the nuclear industry is "proving" it does not care for the public and would leave people homeless and penniless in the case of an accident.

You are so manipulative with your appeal to authority designed to produce an emotional reaction. Anyone who reacts to your subtle troll is called a troll and anyone who argues your point you continue to play your will full ignorance until they give up.

Repealing the P.A act simply means the most dangerous NPPs, like Indian Point and Palo Verde shut down immediately. Then the rest of them progressively close down because their insurance regimen is bought into line with the conditions the rest of industry.

After that there is a massive jobs boom as existing NPPs turbines are converted to natural gas and all of the energy subsidies previously required to keep the nuclear industry afloat are diverted into advancing massive wind, solar and geothermal energy projects.

Nuclear power is keeping America, and many other countries, in poverty because the nuclear industry cares more about existing than whether it is contributing to the public good. Shutting down Nuclear would create the largest economic boom we have seen in our lifetimes.

The only thing the existence of Price Anderson proves is that federal programs are the closest things we have to immortality, once created they never die, even if their need has long since passed.

Then lobby to have it removed. You say Nuclear is the safest thing ever, prove it. Your own reasoning suggests the PA act is not necessary, so commit to your own argument and lobby to repeal the Price Anderson Act because if you don't it just proves that *everything* you say is a complete fabrication designed to frustrate people who simply cannot fathom how deliberately and willfully ignorant you are determined to be.

If you don't argue for removal of the unnecessary Price Anderson Act then it proves all of your posts are a construct to annoy and frustrate people.

More speculation and no data. Try again. With data this time.

No, there are enough key words to overcome your alloplastic reasoning.

You don't care about data, all you care about is being as frustrating and annoying as possible so that people express that and you claim some moral superiority that somehow makes you "right".

It is clear you don't even care about nuclear power, it's just what you use to get whatever emotional reactions you seek from people because people have very polarized opinions on the subject. You project your troll mannerisms onto others with your techniques so you can claim they are trolls. You're skilled at it and I suggest that anyone who reads this is going to recognize what you do instantly.

Nuclear power is safer than anything else. We have the data. Show me otherwise.

Sure.
Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster
Chernobyl nuclear disaster
Windscale nuclear fire
Three_Mile_Island_accident

All INES 5 or greater nuclear disasters. If you claim they did no harm, prove it and go to Fukushima and help with the cleanup. I hear properties in the area are being given away. Prove that nuclear is safe by going to Fukushima reactor sites otherwise you are saying that nuclear has no place in our energy supply.

The existence of the Price Anderson Act "proves" nothing. If it's there then nuclear power is "proven" unsafe.

Yes, it is there and yes it proves that nuclear power is unsafe.

If we make attempts to repeal it then the nuclear industry is "proving" it does not care for the public and would leave people homeless and penniless in the case of an accident.

You are so manipulative with your appeal to authority designed to produce an emotional reaction. Anyone who reacts to your subtle troll is called a troll and anyone who argues your point you continue to play your will full ignorance until they give up.

Repealing the P.A act simply means the most dangerous NPPs, like Indian Point and Palo Verde shut down immediately. Then the rest of them progressively close down because their insurance regimen is bought into line with the conditions the rest of industry.

After that there is a massive jobs boom as existing NPPs turbines are converted to natural gas and all of the energy subsidies previously required to keep the nuclear industry afloat are diverted into advancing massive wind, solar and geothermal energy projects.

Nuclear power is keeping America, and many other countries, in poverty because the nuclear industry cares more about existing than whether it is contributing to the public good. Shutting down Nuclear would create the largest economic boom we have seen in our lifetimes.

The only thing the existence of Price Anderson proves is that federal programs are the closest things we have to immortality, once created they never die, even if their need has long since passed.

Then lobby to have it removed. You say Nuclear is the safest thing ever, prove it. Your own reasoning suggests the PA act is not necessary, so commit to your own argument and lobby to repeal the Price Anderson Act because if you don't it just proves that *everything* you say is a complete fabrication designed to frustrate people who simply cannot fathom how deliberately and willfully ignorant you are determined to be.

If you don't argue for removal of the unnecessary Price Anderson Act then it proves all of your posts are a construct to annoy and frustrate people.

Certainly a good option for when there are no jobs due to AI doing it all....I think a negative income tax is best for now though. Milton Friedman was a huge proponent of this.

Certainly a good option for when there are no jobs due to AI doing it all....I think a negative income tax is best for now though. Milton Friedman was a huge proponent of this.

If you work for about 26 calendar weeks, you get 400 days of approximately 60% of their salary in Finland for each day of unemployment. This consists of 705 EUR "base daily payment" (peruspäiväraha) and earned part (ansio-osa) determined by salary while working. Additionally if recepient has children, base daily payment is increased by 5,29EUR/day for one child, 7,77EUR for two and 10,02EUR for three or more.

Note that even the base payment rate is higher than this particular UBI test run.

Source:
https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

If you don't meet the requirement, you fall to base unemployment benefits, which are approximately 702EUR/month, paid weekly. You can earn up to 300EUR on top of that in salary without it impacting these benefits, and you can also earn additional 4,74EUR per day if you participate in activity "which improves your chances of getting employment".

https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

UBI was paid on top of these social benefits (among others, these are far from the only social benefits unemployed person is entitled to), and its primary stated goal was to amortize against the often small difference of gaining salary but losing unemployment benefits. Result show the test run to be an abysmal failure, as test group scored marginally lower on finding employment than control group that didn't get the extra money on top of their unemployment benefits.

If you work for about 26 calendar weeks, you get 400 days of approximately 60% of their salary in Finland for each day of unemployment. This consists of 705 EUR "base daily payment" (peruspäiväraha) and earned part (ansio-osa) determined by salary while working. Additionally if recepient has children, base daily payment is increased by 5,29EUR/day for one child, 7,77EUR for two and 10,02EUR for three or more.

Note that even the base payment rate is higher than this particular UBI test run.

Source:
https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

If you don't meet the requirement, you fall to base unemployment benefits, which are approximately 702EUR/month, paid weekly. You can earn up to 300EUR on top of that in salary without it impacting these benefits, and you can also earn additional 4,74EUR per day if you participate in activity "which improves your chances of getting employment".

https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

UBI was paid on top of these social benefits (among others, these are far from the only social benefits unemployed person is entitled to), and its primary stated goal was to amortize against the often small difference of gaining salary but losing unemployment benefits. Result show the test run to be an abysmal failure, as test group scored marginally lower on finding employment than control group that didn't get the extra money on top of their unemployment benefits.

Technically no but while we are sparing with strawmen you may wish to note %37 is higher than the national average https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

"Wage slaves" already get up to 400 days of approximately 60% of their salary in Finland, provided they worked enough (=26 calendar weeks working) for each day of unemployment. This consists of 705 EUR "base daily payment" (peruspäiväraha) and earned part (ansio-osa) determined by salary while working. Additionally if recepient has children, base daily payment is increased by 5,29EUR/day for one child, 7,77EUR for two and 10,02EUR for three or more.

Note that even the base payment rate is higher than this particular UBI test run.

Source:
https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

If you don't meet the requirement, you fall to base unemployment benefits, which are approximately 702EUR/month, paid weekly. You can earn up to 300EUR on top of that in salary without it impacting these benefits, and you can also earn additional 4,74EUR per day if you participate in activity "which improves your chances of getting employment".

https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

"Wage slaves" already get up to 400 days of approximately 60% of their salary in Finland, provided they worked enough (=26 calendar weeks working) for each day of unemployment. This consists of 705 EUR "base daily payment" (peruspäiväraha) and earned part (ansio-osa) determined by salary while working. Additionally if recepient has children, base daily payment is increased by 5,29EUR/day for one child, 7,77EUR for two and 10,02EUR for three or more.

Note that even the base payment rate is higher than this particular UBI test run.

Source:
https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

If you don't meet the requirement, you fall to base unemployment benefits, which are approximately 702EUR/month, paid weekly. You can earn up to 300EUR on top of that in salary without it impacting these benefits, and you can also earn additional 4,74EUR per day if you participate in activity "which improves your chances of getting employment".

https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

maybe this tech could be used in some thing like bubble memory but at a size, speed, and density that makes it equal or better to existing nonvolatile memory storage tech.

Yes, people can get bored doing nothing. While some will continue to due nothing, most people want to feel useful, needed, and accomplish something meaningful to THEIR life.

I'll go a step further. If you prevent people from working, they become restless and aggravated. That's how revolutions start. Some people think it's the poor and hungry masses that overthrow governments. However, I don't see North Koreans overthrowing the government. Idled able-bodied workers are the ones who start trouble.

"Idle hands are the devils playground" and all that.

You have that backwards.

The U.S., UK, and Ireland use common law (aka case law), meaning the law is subject to interpretation by judges. And the interpretation by other judges in previous cases can result in the meaning of the law changing.

Outside of the UK and Ireland, all of Europe uses civil law. The law is as written and passed by the legislature, and not open to interpretation. It is in fact set it stone. If there is an ambiguity or contradiction with other laws, it needs to be fixed by the legislature by changing the law.

You have that backwards.

The U.S., UK, and Ireland use common law (aka case law), meaning the law is subject to interpretation by judges. And the interpretation by other judges in previous cases can result in the meaning of the law changing.

Outside of the UK and Ireland, all of Europe uses civil law. The law is as written and passed by the legislature, and not open to interpretation. It is in fact set it stone. If there is an ambiguity or contradiction with other laws, it needs to be fixed by the legislature by changing the law.

This country was built on public works and institutions. Unfortunately in the past 70 years or so we have moved steadily away from this and toward the notion that everything has to make a profit to be useful. To some there is no profit that does not equal monetary profit.

Everything does have to be profitable to be useful. Being profitable means that the buyer finds something more useful than the seller, and conducts the purchase or trade. That determination is essential to improving the efficiency of your economy, and thus increasing overall productivity. Products or services which are not profitable cost more than they contribute to the economy, and thus are a net drain on the economy (lowers productivity and thus the average standard of living).

Public works and institutions still have to be profitable to be worthwhile. The profit is just not obvious because the payer (the government) is not the direct beneficiary (the public). A bridge connecting two metropolitan areas is probably profitable - the cost of building the bridge is likely less than the increase in commerce and travel (tourism) the bridge allows. So the bridge results in a increase in economic activity, which more than pays for the cost of building the bridge, and is a net economic gain (is profitable). But a bridge to nowhere has a cost which far exceeds the economic benefit to the public, and represents a public works project which is non-profitable, and thus an example of government waste.

Don't let a hatred of money blind you to this fundamental economic fact. Money is just an abstracted representation of productivity. The true currency is productivity. And more profit means using the same amount of resources to generate more productivity. Money, by virtue of being an abstracted representation, can be disassociated from actual productivity. Gambling is not not productive, but you can make a helluva lot of money doing it. Same for theft, corruption, and scams. But productivity cannot be abstracted or stolen this way. Economic profit is a direct result of improving productivity. Condemning profit is what leads you down a tortured path of economic devastation and reduced standard of living.

This country was built on public works and institutions. Unfortunately in the past 70 years or so we have moved steadily away from this and toward the notion that everything has to make a profit to be useful. To some there is no profit that does not equal monetary profit.

Everything does have to be profitable to be useful. Being profitable means that the buyer finds something more useful than the seller, and conducts the purchase or trade. That determination is essential to improving the efficiency of your economy, and thus increasing overall productivity. Products or services which are not profitable cost more than they contribute to the economy, and thus are a net drain on the economy (lowers productivity and thus the average standard of living).

Public works and institutions still have to be profitable to be worthwhile. The profit is just not obvious because the payer (the government) is not the direct beneficiary (the public). A bridge connecting two metropolitan areas is probably profitable - the cost of building the bridge is likely less than the increase in commerce and travel (tourism) the bridge allows. So the bridge results in a increase in economic activity, which more than pays for the cost of building the bridge, and is a net economic gain (is profitable). But a bridge to nowhere has a cost which far exceeds the economic benefit to the public, and represents a public works project which is non-profitable, and thus an example of government waste.

Don't let a hatred of money blind you to this fundamental economic fact. Money is just an abstracted representation of productivity. The true currency is productivity. And more profit means using the same amount of resources to generate more productivity. Money, by virtue of being an abstracted representation, can be disassociated from actual productivity. Gambling is not not productive, but you can make a helluva lot of money doing it. Same for theft, corruption, and scams. But productivity cannot be abstracted or stolen this way. Economic profit is a direct result of improving productivity. Condemning profit is what leads you down a tortured path of economic devastation and reduced standard of living.

SO, no you have given this person money, they blow it and now have no money for food, shelter, etc.

Do you now give them MORE money or just let them starve on the street.

If you say the former...then, when does it stop?

These would not be isolated cases mind you.

Interesting scenario. I suppose you could have a judge declare them incompetent and name a power of attorney. This happens to senior citizens all of the time.

Those are called fiducials. They are used to very precisely determine the location, distance, and orientation of an object when pictures of that object are taken. Because of their contrasting colors, the edges of different "wedges" are easy for a human or computer vision system to pick up; the center point is the intersection of those edges, etc. The "ovalness" of the fiducial can be used to determine the angle to the camera.

The same kind of fiducials are placed all over crash tests to track motion and displacement.

Yes, just like Obama's economic stimulus package did. Remember how it created hundreds of thousands of jobs while fixing the county's infrastructure? No, I don't either.

That's because it was a right-wing plan mostly composed of tax cuts, and the right-wing president at the time took any direct job creation programs off the table before any votes were cast.

What history are you looking at? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

It was written by Democratic congressional leaders and their staff and it passed in January 2019 when Democrats held all three branches of government (including the presidency). Only 2 Republican senators (the moderates) + Arlen Specter (who was a RINO at the time) voted for it.

I simply said most prisoners aren't awful people? You think the US doesn't have a problem with locking up to many people?
Is the roughly 5% of our population that has been incarcerated is disposable?

The only long debunked theory I see in this thread is that family and friends increase recidivism. There is 40 years+ of evidence and studies that disprove this, but I guess it just "feels wrong" to you.

Google should stand up against retarded legislation (like this link tax).

The word "link tax" for Article 11 is deliberately misleading to the point of falsehood: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

The version of the directive voted on by European Parliament Committee on Legal Affairs contained explicit exemptions for the act of hyperlinking and "legitimate private and non-commercial use of press publications by individual users"

The proposal attaches several new conditions to the right, including expiry after one year and exemptions for either copying an "insubstantial" part of a work or for copying it in the course of academic or scientific research...

So (1) it specifically and explicitly isn't a "link tax", and (2) it only prevents a News Aggregator from copying substantial parts of a work. Of course that's uselessly vague so it would have to go on to case law to determine what counts as substantial and what doesn't.

If you don't like it go live in North Korea

"Voice" is often the better choice than "exit."

Exit, Voice and Loyalty

The ITU is the group that comes up with the specs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... the same way that the IOC covers Olympics and the International Bureau of Weights and Measures says what a "meter" and a "kilogram" are.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

720p is higher definition than standard broadcast definition (480i / 525-lines). It's 2.67x the resolution and twice the frame rate. (same field rate as 480i, but interlaced fields only update half the lines). HD ready logos are usually pretty clear about what you're getting.

If you want to go after someone, then those horrible 1366x768 LCD TVs that accept downscaled 1080p are perhaps the biggest offenses.

Google respects robots.txt I thought.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Well, if 90 percent of the Department of Energy budget is for fossil fuel incentives, and their budget is x amount, the math is fairly simple

It's not that simple, because despite it's name, the Department of Energy is not primarily about the production and consumption of energy. Rather, it's primary mission is managing the U.S. nuclear weapons program: the design and manufacture of the weapons, making sure they still work, fundamental nuclear research, etc.

Here is the DoE FY2019 budget request fact sheet. It's a $30.6B department - tiny in the scope of the U.S. federal government. The top line item, fully one half of that budget, is "National Nuclear Security Administration".

Surprised? You're not alone. The present Secretary of Energy, Rick Perry, also apparently didn't know that the DoE, ya know, doesn't do much with energy. That is, of course, when he wasn't forgetting about it entirely. Ooops.

And it's here, at the end of what I hope was an informative post, that I'll point out Obama's first DoE secretary was a Nobel laureate in physics.

Every nuclear promise has come to naught, nuclear has already failed so instead of wasting our resources on something that provides no energy return it's time to try something different.

Seriously? Nuclear power in France has been going strong for decades without issue.

Nuclear power is the largest source of electricity in the country, with a generation of 379.1 TWh, or 71.6% of the country's total production of 519.4 TWh, the highest percentage in the world.

I have the same concern, particularly with regards my MS Natural Ergonomic 4000 keyboard: I use the Mute key all the time for exactly what it does natively on Windows 7 (and did on XP too): mutes all audio on the system. If this functionality is implemented in the browser, what exactly happens? Does it mute the tab (something Chrome 71 already made a mess of)? Does it mute audio in the entire browser? And if it does either of those, is there a way to disable it (say, through chrome://flags)? Because if not, that's a huge problem and major oversight.

As I wrote the above paragraph, I noticed that a reply came in elsewhere indicating that apparently the only keys it'll look at are play/pause/seek and track-oriented keys. What if people are already using those with their media player of choice? Furthermore, the document is marked Editor's Draft as of 2019/02/09, a.k.a. working draft, a.k.a. subject-to-change-at-any-moment. And even if it wasn't, we all know this is exactly how it begins: today it supports only those functions, but 6 months from now it's extended to support Mute and Volume Up/Down, which will provoke someone to consider adding Home, Favourites, Mute, Calculator, etc. via something similar -- all keys that have historically (we're talking 15+ years, folks) been dedicated to the UX aspect of the OS only, UNLESS you specifically went out of your way to configure them on a per-program basis and within that program (ex: Winamp), with some exceptions (read: Internet Explorer actually does use some of these keys itself when running) -- then it'll get extended to Logitech G15 LCD so the browser can print stupid crap on the LCD, followed by RGB LED tweaking, then some kind of fan RPM mod, blah blah blah. This is what's called creeping featurism and it is not a new phenomenon, but its prevalence has greatly amplified in the past 10 or so years.

I have no problem with the browser implementing, say, the appropriate API functions so that an extension/add-on could be used to set said keys up in the browser to perform media-related tasks (not a bad idea really, sort of akin to what the Streamdeck does alongside OBS Studio) -- the user has to install the Chrome extension by choice, thus the concern is alleviated for everyone as a default (read: majority) and bugs/quirks only affect those who effectively opted in through use of an extension.

In all seriousness, the past few major Chrome releases -- 70, 71, and 72 -- all brought with them more UX-related problems than improvements, IMO. For example, in 72 for whatever reason they decided to get rid of the incredibly useful details at chrome://net-internals/#proxy that would tell you what the active/effective settings were -- extremely useful for knowing if your PAC file was loaded or not, if a proxy was in use at all (and if so, if it was SOCKS or DIRECT or what), etc.. And just today I found they removed the chrome://net-internals/#events viewer entirely and replaced it with a dump-crap-to-a-file model that requires you to install Python and a completely separate external utility to decode it. What was wrong with doing this natively? Why not offer both?

I say all of this as a person who is an extremely strong advocate of KISS principle. I just don't see why removing useful information and capabilities of this sort is considered positive progress. Likewise, I don't see how adding media keys support to a browser is progress either. I think it creates more problems and annoyances than it solves. Obligatory Jurassic Park reference.

"Upgrade or replace every building in US for state-of-the-art energy efficiency."...The quote mentions "replace" so I presume they are willing to demolish buildings that don't meet the standard.

Or upgrade. Don't forget upgrade!

"Build out high speed rail"...At last count the cost has ballooned from the original $6B to $10.6B - almost double...

Correct, the estimates were made during the recession when construction and land acquisition costs were low. And the more time we take to build it, the more it will cost. Thanks, inflation!

And remember, the alternative to spending an estimated $70 billion on the bullet train is spending $119.0 billion on for 4,295 new lane-miles of highway, plus $38.6 billion for 115 new airport gates and 4 new runways, for a total estimated cost of $158 billion, just to move the same number of people. I would rather pay almost double $70 billion than almost double $158 billion, wouldn't you?

Don't trains also pollute? Or maybe Elon Musk going to build solar trains and solve all of that for us.

These will be EMUs so yes, they can be solar powered.

The real question, of course, is how much will this boondoggle actually cost... In other words, astronomical not to mention completely impractical.

Just like the Interstate Highway System! So far it has cost us $425 billion for something that was supposed to cost $25 billion. What a boondoggle!

The cell phones are made by Motorola Mobility, which was bought by Google (for its telecommunications patent portfolio) and sold to Lenovo (after stripping out most of the patents).

Motorola's semiconductor business was spun off as Freescale Semiconductor in 2004, and operated independently for a decade. Freescale was bought by NXP Semiconductors (a Dutch company) in 2015.

Nuclear energy is a requirement of renewables because renewables are high risk with regard to extreme events,

The Fukushima Nuclear power plant was overwhelmed by an extreme natural event due to criminal negligence of the TEPCO board. We have seen that Nuclear power cannot be operated in very hot environments in France's heatwaves, floods for example and in the US. Pleanty of examples with a quick web search.

No dome required.

Think about what you're saying for a moment. The only source of energy on the entire Earth that is not ultimately from sunlight is nuclear. While I'm in favour of more nuclear power, for the moment, let's cut it from the conversation, we can come back to it.

When you say solar can only cover 2% with complete efficiency over the entire US, you're saying that every year you have to use 50 years worth of energy. But then take down the efficiency and covering the entire US etc. and it's much more than that. And the stored energy in the form of fossil fuels, wind, and water potential energy, etc., is being stored at far, far, far less efficiency. I think I'm being super generous in suggesting that 0.1% efficiency is there. Meaning you actually need to consume 50000 years of US history to get 1 year of fuel.

This is *clearly* unsustainable along foreseeable timelines. It's one thing to argue that solar tech is impractical for logistical reasons etc., but if you can't do it with magicalb 100% efficiency and full coverage, then you have pre-admitted to being doomed.

Well, except for nuclear. But I have bad news, the Sun is emitting a fucktonne more nuclear energy at the Earth than the Earth can produce. The advantage to nuclear on Earth is you can produce that in a small, contained area. But if you have magical 100% efficiency solar panels and can cover an entire country, that's not an advantage anymore.

All this is to say, your statement doesn't make any sense on its own face. If you want to check out the wikipedia article, it's plain to see that the worldwide solar energy is tens to hundreds of thousands of times more than energy use: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.... Now, you did specify the US, not the whole world. The US land area is 2% of the world's surface area (not land surface area, total area), and 18% of total energy consumption. So in essence, you can multiple the problem by 9 for just the US.

TL;DR:

I ran the numbers. It comes to somewhere between the US having ten thousand and a hundred thousands times enough sunlight even with no move toward increased efficiency, and that's already including the demand of charging electric vehicles because it already accounts for gasoline energy in cars. Which is good because, as is obvious, we can't capture all of it, we need some to grow food, etc..

Man, I didn't even realize Hillary was running in the 90s!

Network neutrality has a much older pedigree than any one particular bill. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

One problem with this bill is that it wants the government to run the transition. This is a non-starter for those on the right who will note how often the government has failed to add value. As just one example, note the debt problems in Greece basically because a too-large percentage of workers were employed by the government and the government took on too much debt. Government, by definition, does not contribute to GNP. It's administrative overhead. Yet this bill is supposedly promising a large number of jobs being created. A government bill can really only create government jobs

The transition to vastly reduced emissions should instead be made by industry, with government incentives. The government should make it financially beneficial for energy companies to figure out how to supply green energy, even at night. Energy companies will make it happen if it helps them survive. Something like a tax credit for a megaton or gigaton of CO2 emissions removed. And government should not specify things like it can't be nuclear. Nuclear should definitely be an option if the energy producers can make it economically viable.

A combination of carrot (tax credits for CO2 not generated) and stick (fines for generating CO2) may be necessary to goad private industry into making the necessary changes.