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That's rubbish. It's embarrassing how many global warming activists rely on their childish caricatures of "deniers".

I'm not American. That's a pretty funny caricature. I admit that there are many who would be skeptics regardless of what the science says. Sadly the same is plainly true for most global warming activists. It is sad to see otherwise thoughtful people resort to silly stereotypes. You hold up the Sarah Palins of the world as though they are the leading thinkers in the skeptical camp. What a joke. Why not seek out the best skeptical minds out there and hear what they have to say? Judith Curry's blog would be a good place to start.

My last car was $24K brand new (not doing that again though) . You want me to pay 3x that price for a Tesla?

No. I really don't care what you do.

Not to mention that your price is about $25K too low. If you buy a Model S, with the big battery, internal fast charger and a home charging station (which is absolutely necessary if you intend to actually USE the car daily) you are going to be over $120K or so which is 5x what my last car cost and well beyond what 99.99% of us can afford to pay for a car.

The larger battery Tesla is $81k (assuming you aren't arguing you need the sport model; which would be specious at best). The wall connector is $1,200 (and you'll pay an electrician $200 to install it). So you are at $83k. Which is comparable to a moderately equipped BMW 550i.

Of course: I'll get between $7k and $10k back in tax incentives. Also: the 8-year warranty is standard (getting the CPO warranty and maintenance contracts on the BMW is going to push it's costs up almost $10k). So now Tesla has a $10k-$20k advantage. For simplicity, we'll just apply that as a credit to the Tesla (as opposed to a bill on the BMW) and we are now looking at the (equivalent cost) of a $60k BMW... a moderately appointed 528 or stripped 535.

Except that I'm also going to save a lot of money on gas.

Your 99% number is complete and utter crap. The 98th percentile (you know, the 1% after the top 1%) likely make about $250k annually (the IRS doesn't track, but it's a good guess). That would put a Tesla at about 40% of annual income. This would be equivilant to someone making $50k buying a $12k car (actually: more like someone making $50k buying an $8k car because not all expenses scale and disposable income is a higher percentage for upper income brackets)

Not going to do it. WAY too many reasons and it starts with PRICE. No way I'm making the payments on a Tesla and paying my mortgage too. No way I'm driving a car with maybe a 200 mile range and then takes 30 min to "refuel" for the next 100 miles. No way I'm buying a car that I cannot quickly refuel where the in-laws live, even though I could GET there on a charge, I'd be stuck there for the duration of the charging process using 110V15A extension cord, and believe you me, that's TOO long there. (3.7 miles per HOUR of charge! Ouch, I'm going to be there at least 1.5 days to get my empty battery back to 200 miles capacity...)

No, Tesla's are mostly for show, for the people who can afford to spend $100K on a toy. Few buy them for actually DRIVING someplace except for maybe work and back. Can you imagine trying to drive one of these cross country? Portland to LA? I'm sure it would be an adventure, but if all you got was 200 miles per charge, you are going to be on the road a LONG time.

On my recent trip from PA to FL, I saw two Tesla in the middle of a long-distance trip (at a charging station in NC where I stopped for the night).

But I own two cars. I don't use both for cross-country trips. If (when?) I get a Tesla it is likely to be used almost exclusively for destinations within 200miles.

That said: You can also change out batteries at a super-station. It costs $80, but you get fully charged in 1 minute. It's barely more expensive than the gas for the same trip and, when you aren't running cross-country, you have no costs at all.

It's not for you? Fine. Don't get one. But your caricature is false.

Yeah, you say that's a caricature, but can you give me any evidence it's not?

Prominent deniers not engaged in these tactics?

What nonsense. You apparently have no idea what real critics of global warming are discussing. You are at least as ignorant as those you caricature.

The reason why most people hate cops is that they do not want to take responsibility for their own actions.

Pft, please. Really? This is what you think is going on in people's heads? This is the sort of laughable caricature that I don't even have to refute because most people are going to read that and think you're an idiot. You're not helping the reputation of police officers if this is what they raise their kids to believe. You can't even fully stomach it yourself because you know it's flamebait.

The entire point I was trying to make... is that most cops just want to do their job and go home.

Right, that is almost EXACTLY why this is such a problem. Most of them aren't professionals that do the right thing even if the path is hard. To most cops, it's just a job and they want to go home at the end of the day. They will not rock the boat and blow whistles. They will come into an established system that looks out for their own and they will do nothing to stop it because that's the path of least resistance. They are complacent and comfortable. This isn't just limited to the cops. It's one of those more universal problems. I've seen this a lot in engineering. You'd hope they were professionals, cared about doing a good job, and not just there to punch in, turn the cog, and punch out. But no, most people just don't have that fire. Anyway, YES, the initial point you made is utterly true and the root cause of the problem at hand.

before you basically assumed my dad has covered for a bad cop and therefor makes himself a bad guy,

HAHAHA, even after I lambast you for assuming an antagonistic stance you still double-down and put up your dukes. And you still don't have any idea why people distrust cops. That's kind of adorably cliche.

Seriously though, ask your dad the question. Post his answer and what sort of conversation you guys had after that. A youtube video would be best. Given the shit in Ferguson, it'll be pertinent and insightful.

From TFA:

Diane Ravitch, an education historian at New York University who has been a vocal critic of Gates, put even it more starkly: âoeWhen I think about history, I think about different perspectives, clashing points of view. I wonder how Bill Gates would treat the robber barons. I wonder how Bill Gates would deal with issues of extremes of wealth and poverty.â (The Big History Project doesnâ(TM)t mention robber barons, but it does briefly address unequal distribution of resources.) Ravitch continued: âoeIt begins to be a question of: Is this Bill Gatesâ(TM)s history? And should it be labeled âBill Gatesâ(TM)s Historyâ(TM)? Because Bill Gatesâ(TM)s history would be very different from somebody elseâ(TM)s who wasnâ(TM)t worth $50-60 billion.â (Gatesâ(TM)s estimated net worth is approximately $80 billion.)

It's a case of the "Slashdot approach" to topic being discussed.
Not reading TFA (TFC? TFH?) and complaining about something which may or may not be there, based on personal prejudice.

I.e. Questioning how will "Gates History", which it is not, deal with sensitive issues regarding money and wealth acquisition, implying a conflict of interest.
For no reason other than Bill Gates' involvement with the course.
Because Bill Gates is apparently Scrooge McDuck even in the minds of highly educated people like "Diane Ravitch, an education historian at New York University".
A caricature of a human/duck hybrid, who loves only money, and is willing to rewrite history in order to please money gods.

The United States will start to do to Russian Federation what it did to the Soviets. We will squeeze and wait. And after 30 years of being squeezed... Russia will probably fracture again. Probably in the far east... and then humbled again... we will offer Russia peace, friendship, and a place at the table. We'll see how small Russia needs to get before it is willing to behave itself.

Only problem w/ this theory. To split up Russia, there would need to be a large population which can be broken away from Russia on ethnic, religious or other lines. For the Soviet Union, there were those 14 other 'republics' that automatically gained independence once Boris Yeltsin pulled Russia out of the Soviet Union, making the latter a caricature of itself before it was dissolved.

But today's Russia is more or less a homogenous nation. What you're wishing for would have been possible had the Siberians, say, been a different ethnic people from the Russians. They're not. Granted, there are Mongoloid Shaman people in Krasnoyarsk going Eastwards, but not in the numbers that would constitute a viable nation. Fact remains that Russians are a homogenous majority from the Baltic to the Bering Straits.

Yeah, there are renegade groups like the Chechens & Tatars who would like independence. Guess what - unlike Ukraine, which has borders w/ several other countries, both a Chechnya & a Tatarstan would be landlocked countries within Russia - much like Lesotho - and would be at the mercy of Russia for all of their needs. Also, since Russians from other ex-Soviet republics, be it Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, et al are returning to Russia, it just bolsters Russian numbers even more.

I do think the Russians would do well to populate Siberia (not gulag style) so that they stop leaning heavily on Ukraine or Georgia or other such countries.

Men die in the same way! And in much more gruesome and jovial manners. I think when this occasionally happens to women and it's considered more important is more of a reflection of our attitudes of men's lives being less important than women's than any negative view there is of women. You can't honestly believe that male video game characters do not die in heinous ways more than female characters. You don't think it's interesting that you find that totally normal for men and something that needs to be stopped for women? Women cannot be the same part of a narrative as a men unless they can actually be put in the same part. Which according to Sarkeesian and yourself they cannot be because *reasons*.

So if you watch the latest video, she does touch on that somewhat. I'm going to assume you haven't (or at least, that someone reading our discussion hasn't) and point out the salient bits.

First, that when men die in these games, they're generally an antagonist or actor that actually has a measure of agency. They're killed because they were involved in a conflict that revolved around more than just their gender or their victimhood.

Second, part of why you're gruesomely killing the men in these games is often justified by the violence that the men are (arbitrarily) enacting against women. The women die as props to show off how bad someone is in a wild caricature of evil. She's right in pointing out that violence against women is most often perpetrated by 'normal' men. A woman is FAR more likely to be raped by a friend or family member than a random bad man on the street.

Third, men die in ways that aren't overtly sexualised. Women die on beds in lingerie with their legs spread and their tits hanging out. They're still T&A even after brutal violence.

She's right that sexual and sexualised violence is used as a lazy shortcut to show how bad a person is. You can instantly justify murdering someone brutally (to bring it back to your complaint) if we've just shown them as hitting a woman or raping them. It's not the nicest cycle.

Given that we know men are far more likely to be murdered or die in war would it not be a good idea to hold off on this bit of violence? You can do what you want in your games. But when you're trying to tell other people they're being bad or "insensitive" based on the games they create or like to play you actually are trying to make them feel bad so that they stop.

The worst part about her criticisms is that she actually doesn't understand the tropes she's talking about. Or she just makes up new tropes. Tropes are pretty much a necessary part of storytelling. That's why we call them tropes. They've been around since the advent of storytelling. All stories are just rehashes and variations of old ones.

I don't think people have to stop doing anything. But I think they DO need to think about what they're doing, understand whether it's appropriate narratively, and make those decisions with open eyes. Speaking personally, for the first ten years of my career, I definitely didn't think about this stuff as much. Maybe I would've spoken up more about certain things if I had.

I understand that the word 'trope' actually has several meanings, but in this context, she's using the word 'trope' as 'cliché'. You DON'T need to write something that relies heavily on clichés. At the very least, you don't need to write something that heavily relies on the sorts of tropes that may be damaging to our ideas about women.

I really can't agree with that. Using her same irrational argument style you could paint that same problems onto any media. You think playwriting needs to respond to this criticism if it wants to be credible in the world? Shakespeare the misogynist! The gaming community tried to respond with the appropriate "you're going to have to do better" and explained why to her. She chose instead to focus on people making fun of her for saying stupid things. Everybody with

I don't think that these types of polarizing caricatures are helpful. I believe in a free market solution to this problem. There are many others who also prefer a conservative based solution to this problem. You are dismissing half of the population as science denying yahoos when what you need to be doing is coming together to figure out whether your solutions are at all compatible with ours.

" if the Internet was a dude, we'd all agree that dude has a serious problem with women. "

And? So what? Adam Savage's simple minded statement obviously assumes that no man ever could or should have a problem with the behavior of some women. And yet the feminists keep shrieking that ALL men are pigs, that ALL men are rapists or rape apologists, ALL men are oppressors.

Perhaps Adam Savage and his ilk should try meeting an actual woman once in their lives. Otherwise, his attitude reeks of naïve white knighting based on worn out codes of chivalry themselves based on nothing but a caricature of the human female as imagined by other white knights.

Furthermore, by it's own actions, Fark implicitly admits that women are weaker (and therefore unequal), needing the special protection of da menz (thereby perpetuating patriarchy) to protect their delicate eyes from seeing or reading something that might offend their delicate nature. And yet, one of these selfsame delicate creatures went to prison for killing her baby by putting it in a microwave.

Oh definitely. It really doesn't help that that's actually a quote from the Koran. It almost makes me think that all Muslims are inherently bigoted assholes.

But then again, it doesn't take much work to dig up equally appalling crap in the Jewish/Christian Torah/Bible. Deuteronomy 20: 16-18 comes to mind, which explicitly calls for genocide. However, since that passage doesn't make me think that all Jews and Christians are inherently bigoted assholes, I figured I'd extend that same courtesy to the Muslims and their own holy book. If we can overlook the Jews' and Christians' unpleasant shit, surely we can overlook the Muslims' too.

That being said, those Hamas guys are responsible for having committed some truly horrifying atrocities. I'm not talking about firing unguided rockets northward, occasionally striking something of value (after all, what the fuck other options do they have, regarding resistance?). I'm not talking about capturing Israeli soldiers alive (this is what happens in war; would you prefer they killed them first?). I'm talking about indoctrinating Palestinian children with absurd caricatures of Jews to ensure that the conflict can rage on for another generation. I'm talking about gunning down innocent Palestinian families who have no interest in being martyred. Hamas does plenty of despicable stuff (as does Israel). We don't need to twist some Mohammed quotes from their charter to frame them as some kind of madmen (any more than we need to absurdly claim that Israel wants high civilian casualties among the Palestinians). Neither side has any moral high ground to speak of (no claims of moral equivalence here, though), so let's stop pointing fingers to yell "but look at what they are doing!"

Now, why do I put such a subject header on my comment, when I know it will have me branded as 'anti-Semit' before I even start? Well, because it doesn't actually make much difference - as soon as anybody voices any concern over what Israel does to the Palestinians, they are stamped that way, no matter how carefully and well-intended their put their words. But maybe, just maybe, if I start out being provocative, I can get at least somebody in the automatically responding, pro-Israel faction to at least think and try to see the issue in a more nuanced way.

I am not against Israel's right to exist as a nation; I am pragmatic about it. The state that calls itself Israel is no doubt founded on a historically dubious justification, but it is a current reality and that is what we have to consider. But on the other hand, I don't think what Israel is doing is right, not by many miles. It is not right to annex palestinian territory - if it wasn't right of the European nations to establish colonies all over the world in the 18th and 19th centuries, then it isn't right for Israel to do this now.

And how can it be right for Israel to smash up Gaza's infrastructure, hospitals and schools, killing 10 - 100 Palestinians for every Israeli? The answer is of course, that it isn't. And the outcome in the long run is inevitably that Israel will erode the support it has in the rest of the world. The West has been far too permissive with Israel, because of a long, bad conscience for the Holocaust; but the power of Europe and America is on the wane, and the new powers don't have that historical background. At some point you guys will lose all your allies - what will you do then?

Most of us criticise Israel because we care, and because we expect that you can do so much better - if only you would try. But arguing with you is like arguing with Scientology or Jehovah's Witnesses; there is no honest dialogue taking place. All you do is look for ways to mishear or misinterpret any criticism, and find ways to twist it around as a weapon. Sometimes I don't think you guys want friends in the world; sometimes I think you are addicted to this never ending conflict, because if it ends, you have to look at yourselves and see what miserable creatures you have become; caricatures of the evil bullies that broke you during the Holocaust.

> Any company willing to tell it's investors "screw you", because they are looking long-term instead of focusing only on quarterly gains, that's a company I'm willing to invest in.

They didn't have to tell investors "screw you". Their multiple is ridiculously high. Investors believe the story. This story is about some initial doubt that the long term investments pay off. Forgoing short term gain for long term benefit is a pretty typical thing (it's called CapEx), and investors get worried in times like the last 5 years when companies forgo CapEx in favor of share repurchasing and dividend increases, unless there truly is nothing better for the company to do with their cash.

Your caricature of "investors" shows a pretty naive view of what analysts and investors do. Of course they are not perfect, but outside of day traders, the kind of long term view that you imply can only be done if companies ignore investors, is very much what money managers, fund managers, analysts, and others look for. All you have left is mom and pop individual investors, who make up such a tiny percentage of the share count that companies don't care about their opinions (nor should they).

Dude, seriously, you are such the caricature of an internet tough guy, it's fucking awesome. And I admire your commitment to the charade, too.

Just remember, some people aren't in on the joke and might take you seriously and think the incredibly stupid shit you're claiming you have done is a good idea.

The best thing you could do to help women in this struggle is to shut up. You are exactly the one-sided, brazenly biased overtly obtuse caricature that people have a problem with.

You are of the opinion that nothing bad happens to men and it always happens to women. This does nothing but hurt the conversation because it's demonstrably untrue. I assure you that, as a man, I have been groped at bars, grabbed on the bus, shouted at, "objectified" and all manner of things that would be considered "sexual harassment" in the workplace if it happened to a woman. Just because it doesn't happen to you does not mean it doesn't happen. Some of us guys actually have nice asses.

The line "Not your problem, so sleep well friend" looks like he is intentionally trying to caricature the old communist promise that punishing business will not come back to sting you in the end.

But something tells me pla is being unintentionally funny.

And yet another argument based on a false picture of current (as in at least the last several decades...) astrophysicists. It is really hard to take arguments seriously when they continue to be based on caricatures from some imagination instead of what is going on in the real world.

The fact that laboratory plasma physicists have no actual need for magnetic reconnection in laboratory plasma physics experiments should lead to some skepticism of its inference within the laboratory.

There is some heavy observation and need of reconnection in laboratory plasmas, and has been for some time, as it is central to various effects seen in a multitude of different magnetic confinement geometries, especially those involving self-relaxation of magnetic fields. A lot of this doesn't help those studying astrophysical plasmas, because many are in conditions fundamentally different from observations of systems in space with experiments more relevant to astrophysicists being a much more recent development. Just because astrophysicists have been unable to get much help on reconnection from laboratory plasma until recently doesn't mean physicists concentrating on laboratory plasmas were getting nothing (since it is quite the opposite...).

If those students ever find out about these critiques...

I've seen how reconnection is taught in intro courses at half a dozen universities over at least 20 years, and have seen how it was covered in old textbooks too. In all of those cases it most certainly was not taught as some monolithic, infallible law... considering usually at least three different theories of reconnection are covered with the pros and cons of each, where they are applicable, where they are not, and areas that are unsure. In at least two distinct cases, the professors were actually involved in research in reconnection and had a one or two sentence statement about the theory and situation they were working on, but then gave out papers to read from critics of themselves so students would get a chance to see opposing points and learn something about ongoing work. Otherwise, the topic unfortunately is so expansive in variety, after the basic introduction of concepts and problems, the rest is given as a list of references for students more interested in the topic and current debates in different areas.

if they are not even informed that the idea’s creator has distanced himself from the concept

They aren't usually even told Alfven was the creator or his opinion either way. There are no gods in plasma physics that simply sway people with their opinion. If they back up their opinion with some actual arguments, those arguments get covered.

If we taught students these critiques as they were learning the material, we’d see far less consensus on these points.

If you had learned what actually gets discussed in the field and in the courses from the start, you wouldn't spend so much time deducing the implications of a class full of strawmen being taught by another strawman.

He's a caricature. He thinks that he can put on a suit and people will ignore that he's 400 pounds and has skin that looks like 100 year old leather work boots.

They noted "This is a natural partnership for us" and I was thinking, "what, the Hulu executives are a bunch of foul-mouthed caricatures?" As you noted, they are the brainchild of broadcast networks, so perhaps, yes. I think the characters on South Park may have demonstrated more business savvy than these executives, though.

But, same deal here, I'll never pay for Hulu anything. If Netflix doesn't offer it or I can't otherwise find it, I just don't need to watch it.