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The Little Bomb-Detecting Device That Couldn't
theodp writes "Widely deployed in Iraq and promoted by military leaders, BusinessWeek reports the ADE 651 bomb-detecting device had one little problem: it wouldn't detect explosives (earlier Slashdot story). 'The ADE 651,' reports Adam Higginbotham, 'was modeled on a novelty trinket conceived decades before by a former used-car salesman from South Carolina, which was purported to detect golf balls. It wasn't even good at that.' One thing the ADE 651 did excel at, however, was making money — estimates suggest that the authorities in Baghdad bought more than 6,000 useless bomb detectors, at a cost of at least $38 million. Even though ADE 651 manufacturer James McCormick was found guilty of three counts of fraud and sentenced to 10 years in prison in May, the ADE 651 is still being used at thousands of checkpoints across Baghdad. Elsewhere, authorities have never stopped believing in the detectors. Why? According to Sandia Labs' Dale Murray, the ideomotor effect is so persuasive that for anyone who wants or needs to believe in it, even conclusive scientific evidence undermining the technology it exploits has little power."
But, back when I did, I can tell you: a functional golf ball detector would've been very handy.
#DeleteChrome
James randi too was amazed at how basically all dowsers keep believing they have their special powers even after they've been thoroughly debunked.
Nobody can prove your claims to the contary for the make belive threats you countered
In Ramadi '05 we had these cool spray kits.
It was a little plastic case with several sprays and swabs with some instructions for various kinds of explosive testing.
One day we caught these dudes out on the desert who would dig up UXO's and sell them to local insurgents who would use them for IEDs.
Lat Long: 33.16845,43.635263
We had been trying to catch them for a while but they were on motorcycles... try catching a motorcycle in an up-armor hmmwv.
When we caught them, they didn't have any explosives on them. So we though, hey... why not try out this kit?
They tested positive for 2 kinds of explosives. So we detained them, shipped them off to the detention facility with all the appropriate paper work and evidence... as best we could since we aren't investigators by trade.
So we are back at the OP, thinking how bad-ass we are. Then we get the idea to play with the kit some more. We tested our hands, HESCO barriers, lunch meat, hmmwv windows... everything tested positive. Guess the kits didn't really work as advertised but every unit had one.
Of course, maybe our kit was bad. Or maybe we didn't use the kit correctly. Or there was really explosive residue on everything.
At least the kits weren't WHY we detained them. They were going to be detained anyway. But the Military being dazzled by salesmen or shiny new stuff is nothing new.
THL phish sticks
$37B USD on littoral combat ships
http://nation.time.com/2012/10/05/the-navys-new-class-of-warships-big-bucks-little-bang/
F-35 performance specs lowered
http://australianaviation.com.au/2013/01/f-35-performance-specs-lowered/
Not to mention stuff that no one wants.
M1 tanks.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/28/abrams-tank-congress-army_n_3173717.html
According to Sandia Labs' Dale Murray, the ideomotor effect is so persuasive that for anyone who wants or needs to believe in it, even conclusive scientific evidence undermining the technology it exploits has little power."
That explains a LOT about how the US Congress thinks/works.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
If only people would believe the evidence then we wouldn't be lumbered with all the paranormal and supernatural ideas so widespread in our society today. There are clearly enough stupid people around though to make these cons pay.
Why do we get this story about once every 3 months? This has been shoved into the ground. Let's finally bury it for god's sake.
"Cowardice in a race, as in an individual, is the unpardonable sin." --Teddy Roosevelt
You forgot Cancer Screening saves lives.
Shoot first, drone first, water board first and THEN ask questions.
Who needs theatre?
Privacy is terrorism.
It says in the article the device can detect bombs,guns, ammunition, drugs and elephants.
My question is: Why are Iraqis trying to smuggle elephants through checkpoints?
What amazes me is how long it took.
What needs to happen now is that the people who paid for it using public money, used public money to cover their arses, et cetera, need to be thrown in the slammer for being incompetent.
This was not a bomb detection device, this was just a scam and nothing else. But corruption does not care about such facts and never is going to.
http://www.220.ro/desene-animate/Beavis-And-Butthead-Mr-Anderson-S-Balls/Exolp5FjL2/
The real reason they continue to use these isn't because they somehow have convinced themselves that it works. It's probably not even directly a scam insofar as they're shoving money to some business cohort through the military industrial complex. I would suspect that what this is really about is that it's far cheaper to stick a device in a young man's hand and convince him that it's there to protect him, so that he'll actually continue to actively do his job, and have him wind up being blown up -- than it is to spend money on any sort of real device. The man is disposable. The worthless device is the placebo to motivate him to feel safe in doing his job. And when he dies, it was a far cheaper investment than the amount that any sort of real device would cost to produce, purchase, train on, and deploy.
This article mocks the Iraqi for buying this crap, but the TSA has spent a fortune on similar devices...
That's about the sentence you'd get here for robbing a convenience store, even if you didn't hurt any one. How many people did he kill? Except of course he's getting the equivalent of 3.8 million a year to do his time. Who says crime doesn't pay?
The 'bomb' detectors' work great. Sure, they have a high rate of failure, but all those false positives are a great reason to riffle through somebody's stuff looking for any old 'contraband' you're after.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
All those FDA approved food additives are are fine.
The scanners the TSA uses are safe and effective.
Putting millions on subsidized healthcare and ensuring even more of the incidental costs are hidden from consumers will reduce healthcare spending.
There was no coup in Egypt ...
One of those, the third one specifically, stands out as not fitting the theme.
You do realise it's the *same government* that has given us the TSA, the FDA, and the many other ruinous mistakes in every area it's involved in that you expect is magically going to take charge of health care and make us all better?
Surely you jest.
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Friends don't let friends enable ecmascript.
"Use the Force, Luke!"
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Read "The Golden Bough" and you'll find why this works. It's the same reason magic and religion used to be big things (and guarantee their providers a work-free life):
In a situation where forces you can't control determine your survival, you will grasp at any straw that gives you the illusion of control. It's a normal human reaction. It works even if you know about it. You want to believe, at least unconsciously.
It's probably the oldest scam in the history of mankind.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
I like to yell "halt" before I shoot. It's easier if they aren't moving.
All those FDA approved food additives are are fine.
The scanners the TSA uses are safe and effective.
Putting millions on subsidized healthcare and ensuring even more of the incidental costs are hidden from consumers will reduce healthcare spending.
There was no coup in Egypt ...
One of those, the third one specifically, stands out as not fitting the theme.
You do realise it's the *same government* that has given us the TSA, the FDA, and the many other ruinous mistakes in every area it's involved in that you expect is magically going to take charge of health care and make us all better?
Surely you jest.
This is also the same government that put a lander on Mars with a sky crane and created the internet. And how come the FDA doesn't get credit for making food and drugs in the USA among the safest in the world?
All those FDA approved food additives are are fine.
I'm not sure what you're referring to, but in case you didn't know, lots of the fraudulent stuff you buy to imbibe, inhale, or apply in the USA is on the market precisely because the FDA *doesn't* have jurisdiction over them.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Actually on re-reading I believe I misunderstood the OP and responded erroneously to it.
You then misunderstood us both. Ah well. One of the few times I wish slashdot had a delete button. Hopefully the whole thread will be modded down now.
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Friends don't let friends enable ecmascript.
Selection bais. If people do not like something, the failures define the thing. If they like something, the success define it. Many people like reality to match books and movies and such, nice and simple with clear right and wrong, works and doesn't work.
Some people don't even think it is special powers, just a thing you do. My grandpa did the dowsing thing to decide where to put the various wells on his property. Not because he thought he had special powers, it was just how he'd learned you select your well spot. Anyone could do it. He figured it worked since every time he'd drill that spot, and before long have a functional well.
For him it wasn't magical or special powers, it was just the standard process. Get Y shaped stick, walk around, it signals where the well goes, put it there.
There may be valid reasons the Iraqi forces are using these fake detectors. If the look of these devices makes some clueless criminals afraid of smuggling explosives, they are serving their purpose in preventing crime.
They cost so much, that if they do not work then someones head is on the chopping block...
Health care insurance doesn't mean the government actually takes out your gall bladder, they just pay for having it taken out with taxpayer money. The government is good at spending taxpayer money, but not half so good as the insurance companies are at siphoning off profits. But then, who ever heard of a government making money?
Why is it that the state can claim I will get rich off of their numbers racket (lottery), and they don't go to jail. My thinking is that he just didn't pay off the correct people in government to be able to get away with this particular level of corruption. I mean defense contractors are fleecing the public all the time, but they at least have the smarts to know who to pay off. Drug companies sell dangerous habit forming pharacuticals to people who would be better served with exercise. But they pay lots of taxes (bribes) , so they don't go to jail. Common street dealers know who they need to pay off. This guy just didn't know who to pay off. I kind of feel sorry for the guy. He had a great idea and chutzpah, but through no fault of his own, he just didn't know who to buy off. They should have a public commision that will show up and aspiring criminal and politicians how the game works, and which wheels need to be greased. Maybe our president could get on it. I mean it is totally not fair that someone who could have made a great governor, CEO, or even senator should be rotting in jail.
It's got the all powerful Placebo Effect on its side. Seriously, just thinking about a bomb detector would make anyone who has dark intentions seem more jumpy, thus distinguishing them from the rest of the lackluster bunnies.
>This is also the same government that put a lander on Mars with a sky crane and created the internet. And how come the FDA doesn't get credit for making food and drugs in the USA among the safest in the world?
Because according to WingnutWisdom, the government can do nothing right and should be looted to enrich well placed scoundrels. Of course if they had even a passing relationship with reality, they'd learn some science and some compassion, and stop being wingnuts.
Now, while they're technologically incapable of their purpose, I wonder if they might actually be somewhat effective in real life? IE a different type of placebo?
It says that they're being used at a number of checkpoints. Now, one of the things I know about is that the insurgents/terrorists tend to observe such places before they target them. Often at some distance, but eh.
The ones doing the observing are often no more educated than those working the checkpoint, often less. So they see the operators using their 'bomb detector' in all seriousness. They think 'crap! They'd find our bomb, time to figure out a different plan!' and either delay or go elsewhere. So the end result is that they still have fewer attacks against that checkpoint.
I don't read AC A human right
...651 bomb-detecting device had one little problem: it wouldn't detect explosives...
Good.
Health care insurance doesn't mean the government actually takes out your gall bladder, they just pay for having it taken out with taxpayer money. The government is good at spending taxpayer money, but not half so good as the insurance companies are at siphoning off profits. But then, who ever heard of a government making money?
The problem here is to allow the siphon that private insurance companies invariably mean. Pay for the healthcare without the overhead of insurance companies. But no, that's against the law in the US, because that would be the government outcompeting private companies.
As for governments making money, there are plenty of examples. All in countries were governments aren't barred by law from making money.
(But then comes a wind from the right, and some populist right wing politicians tell how much better everything will be with privatization. He gets the votes, and the government sells its profitable businesses. Service goes down, prices go up, and everybody is happy. Er.)
Shocker: In the face of conclusive evidence understandable to anybody with an IQ higher than a kumquat, people still believe in:
Ponzi schemes
Homeopathy
Dowsing
Young-earth creationism
Psychics
Never underestimate the stubbornness of otherwise-rational people.
If the idea was to intimidate people through the use of "security theater", there are cheaper ways to do so. Fake surveillance cameras are cheap. These bogus bomb detectors were not.
Also, it sounds like you are making the common mistake of assuming the bad guys are morons. They can read the internet too; this $hit's been splashed all over the New York Times... if they know the devices are bogus then they'll target checkpoints that have them, knowing they don't work.
And believing you are screening for explosives when you are doing nothing of the sort is worse than useless. There ARE viable means of detecting explosives, but if you think your bases are already covered you are never going to deploy them.
So did the authorities actually test them?
They have sample explosives for bomb dogs to find surely they could test the detectors in the same way. Its not an expensive test process.
http://blog.karit.geek.nz/
It has nothing to do with the "ideomotor effect" and everything to do with the stream of money that is still bouncing back and forth to some contractor somewhere and some congressmen, somewhere else. I wonder if they even bothered to hold a "show-and-tell" for military brass and congress-people, where the bomb-detecting robots performed perfectly under controlled conditions.
It's an example of the corrupt reverse of what economists call the "velocity of money". As long as that money's flowing, and a little bit sticks to the hands of everyone who touches it along the way, then there is no incentive to do too much to rock the boat.
Considering most retiring high-level military brass ends up as "consultants" to defense contractors or lobbyists for defense contractors, and as long as the people getting killed are not the sons and daughters of privilege, we cannot expect some lieutenant colonel somewhere is going to care enough to make the people above him mad about slowing the velocity of money.
There are people out there right now who are enjoying the profits from building faulty facilities in Iraq where enlisted people were electrocuted in showers. The worst that could possibly happen is that the company changes its name and carries on. In the case of the showers, Haliburton didn't even have to change its name. Hell, they didn't even have to be low bidder on those contracts because they were no-bid.
There are not many people more cynical than the ones who populate the military/industrial complex (and now, the intelligence/industrial complex). And now with the increased prosecutions against whistleblowers, we'll probably hear less and less about these failures.
You are welcome on my lawn.
The point of this device, just like drug sniffing dogs, is not its ability to actually detect what it's supposed to be looking for. Its purpose to give the police, military, or other arm of the state a plausible excuse to detain and/or search anyone they want.
These are sold to countries with corrupt military. I think they just give a kick back on the sale to senior soldiers and the lower ranks use them because they are ordered to.
It *isn't* that the low ranks using them are self deluded that they work. Because low rank bomb detection soldiers don't make the purchasing decisions, and the high rank military that do, don't go looking for bombs.
So it can't be self delusion.
Look at the countries that buy them, and you can see its likely just corruption.
$3.8M per year for ten years. Get out, retire young. I would take that deal in a frickin' heartbeat.
Hmm...
Hey, Uncle Sam, I hear you need some replacement bomb detectors. Have you taken a look at my brand of detectors that work by the difficult-to-disprove tachyon flux method? Sure, they cost 50% more, but I guarantee at least one of us won't regret your buying them as I sip mohitos on my private beach a decade from now...
I imagine anywhere on his property would have worked. In total he ended up putting in 4 wells in different locations, spread around, for different purposes. Seems like a safe bet there was an aquifer or the like below all of it. I'm sure he could have chosen any spot, and he already knew the area he wanted it in. He just dowsed for the specific spot.
as I was a 9-year old kid going through his tackle box before our fishing trip.
His answer "Fishermen".
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
This is also the same government that put a lander on Mars with a sky crane and created the internet.
Isn't this the same government that couldn't handle English/Metric conversions on another Mars craft?
Who would win this election: Andrew Weiner vs Andrew Weiner's weiner.
There's also designating actual successes as failures and vice versa. The FDA, for instance, blocked approval of thalidomide until more studies were done, limiting the number of victims in the US. When I bring this up, people sometimes try to explain to me how that was a bad thing. I think it boiled down to cyclical reasoning about how it was bad because the market should have been allowed to take care of it, because the market always takes care of these things more efficiently than the FDA.
So its just like microsoft windows.
I thought the were called the GOP.
The sort of person who continues to believe these things work is the sort of person who believes that magnet motors can deliver "free" power.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
For the same reason other decision makers never question their wrong decisions: Their career hangs on it. So if they admit they fucked up royally, it's their end.
For reference, ask any tech who ever had to suffer from some idiot PHB who had some markedroid talk him into buying some expensive, useless tech. Anyone here who didn't ever try to talk some sense into a PHB to finally dump something that keeps sinking money because there is simply NO way this could EVER work but said PHB keeps pumping more money in, in a vain attempt to somehow justify it and the vain hope that it SOMEHOW, SOMETIME finally does what it was promised to deliver?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
How about because they pulled a natural form of vitamin B6 from the shelves so a private company could investigate selling it as a prescription to diabetics with B6 deficiency complications?
The idea behind the FDA is good. The FDA in practice is just another regulator in bed with the private institutions it's been charged with regulating. It's the same fundamental problem that brought us the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe.
I won't join Slashcott. OTOH, If Beta goes live, I just won't be back until it's fixed. Sorry Dice.
There are people on the right that are that idiotic. There are also people on the left that claim that government can do wrong, and how dare you look for waste, fraud, kick-backs, and other abuse.
Both sides are wrong, crazy, and stupid. And the left can quote bad science just as much as the right, they're just not called on it as often.
I won't join Slashcott. OTOH, If Beta goes live, I just won't be back until it's fixed. Sorry Dice.
... The government is good at spending taxpayer money, but not half so good as the insurance companies are at siphoning off profits. But then, who ever heard of a government making money?
Hah. That's rich. Government isn't in the game to make a profit... for itself. It is frequently in it to make a profit for friends, relatives, or kick-backs to politicians. There are plenty of ways that "public" funds become "private" funds.
And if you think insurance companies are good at siphoning off profits... Governments are far better. They just don't pocket the money. They shift it into the "general fund", and spend it however they like. Taxes and fees rarely go away. Given long enough, they tend to become a thinly-veiled revenue grab for the general fund, even if someone swore up and down that it would never be used that way.
I won't join Slashcott. OTOH, If Beta goes live, I just won't be back until it's fixed. Sorry Dice.
PLACEBO EFFECT JUST LIKE THE F35...amongst bribes and a promise of a cushy job in defence industries for generals is the reason we are still wasting coinage after the F35...
Still, placement is critical with bombs. Less the larger they are, but that costs more resources.
What if they're trying to get something beyond the point? What if they want to hit the center of the point?
If they figure they're going to be caught early they'll most likely change their plans.
I don't read AC A human right
Over here in the UK, the government takes it out. Everyone has access to free healthcare. No-one dies because they can't afford insurance, or faces financial ruin because they can only survive with a drug that costs £1000 a month.
On the downsides, a combination of high demand, tight funding and a government constantly starting 'reforms' in such rapid succession that none of them even finishes before the next begins have overstrained the system to the point that all you're promised right away is access to a waiting list.
...is it more effective than the ADE 651?
My dick can detect sexy women. It starts wobbling and points toward such a specimen.
Table-ized A.I.
Bomb-detector, golf ball finder, little difference. In both cases if they turn out to be fake you could lose your balls.
Usually the geology of a region is so that digging at one place or 3 meter away from there make no difference.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
The link to the article in which Kenyan police claim to still believe they work fails to understand Kenyan culture.
Few people in cultures in which honour and shame are important will admit to making a blunder like this, regardless of what they believe. When they say "these things really work!", that is not a reliable indicator that that's what they mean.
It's slightly ironic that the linker takes the false claim at face value, as an example of someone so foolish as to take a false claim at face value. ;-)
David Anderson
No, they're just not elevated to positions of power. Wingnuts on the left are more often to be called out for their foolishness (e.g. Jenny McCarthy).
Actually it was private industry (Lockheed) that did that one.
Because if the insurgent are a bit skeptical, and knows those detector are crap, then they will more likely try THOSE check point fully knowing there is no real detector.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
You can't "prove" religion is false (or true) or that there is (or is not) the presence of God(s). The very essence of religious claims are usually outside falsability. That doesn't mean the claims are true, or should be taught in schools, or have any relation to science. You can believe in God without being an irrational person, even if you could be accused of wishful thinking.
The things I listed ARE falsafiable, yet people continue to believe in them.
>the ideomotor effect is so persuasive that for anyone who wants or needs to believe in it /. saying it was bogus, now we are all back to square 1, thanks /., thanks a whole bunch! ..... ;)
Until they all read the article on
Yes. My point is, if you cherry pick mistakes, every organization will look incompetent. Name one big organization that hasn't made big, costly mistakes. Is Microsoft run by fools who know nothing about software or business because Windows 8 sucks? Does Ford know nothing about cars because they gave us the Pinto?
Nobody can prove your claims to the contary for the make belive threats you countered
Actually, what probably happens is the cop's arrest rate goes way up because the device gives him a reason to search people his sub-conscious tells him are up to no good, but he can't actually justify searching. The device only triggers when his subconscious tells it to trigger, so he can subconsciously engage in all kinds of profiling that the Constitution of his country officially bans. As long as nobody gets arrested solely on the basis of this device the cop's bosses have no reason to stop using it, because courts don't like throwing convictions out unless they're pretty sure you're actually innocent.
You get the same thing in the US with lie detectors. In theory everybody knows they're BS, but if you want a high security clearance you have to pass a lie detector test, and the lie detector test guy will flunk your ass if he figures out you know how to beat the test.
They are so good at siphoning profits that they have learned how to siphon debt. Not making enough profit to buy off your political donors? Just give them money that doesn't exist! I mean shit, you can print it, why not?
Yes it's an anecdote! Were you expecting original research in a Slashdot comment?
All those FDA approved food additives are are fine.
This one is probably technically untrue, because "all" is a lot. The FDA is pretty good, but they're not perfect.
The scanners the TSA uses are safe and effective.
Probably half-true. TSA is not gonna open itself up to major legal liability by using scanners that hurt scannees.
"Effective," is a whole 'nother ball of wax.
Putting millions on subsidized healthcare and ensuring even more of the incidental costs are hidden from consumers will reduce healthcare spending.
Intuitively this makes no sense, but we do have several hundred examples of health systems to compare ourselves to, i9ncluding several dozen high-income countries with economies similar to our own, and what's really fucking weird is that the more hidden costs are the lower they are.
The UK and Canada, for example, never charges anyone for anything. The Brits spend very little on health care per person. The Canadians spend more, but are still like 50% cheaper then we are, and their costs would have to be higher then typical because Canadian Doctors could easily move to Florida and get paid American salaries.
Countries like the Netherlands, Germany, and Switzerland spend between us and the Brits; but they also actually charge people co-pays and insist everyone have a private insurance policy.
There was no coup in Egypt ...
This one is BS, but it's politically important BS because if there was a coup in Egypt then we have to stop paying the Egyptians to be nice to the Israelis, which would mean they'd technically go to a state of war with Israel (the peace treaty between Israel and Egypt is part of a three-way deal with us), poor Bibi Netanyahu would not be able to cut his conventional army to pay for social services, etc.
There's a degree of selection bias in that last sentence.
Obama, for example, goes on and on about "waste, fraud, and abuse," which is apparently exactly prevalent enough for him to hit his currently desired budget numbers. OTOH, his opponents frequently imply it's all waste because it's the government that does it.
Anti-vaxers can't say anything without being called out. I mean literally anything. RFK Jr. and Jenny McCarthy couldn't bitch about the NRA without snarky comments implying they're doing it to legitimize their anti-vaxer agenda from almost all of the people who hate the NRA. Anti-GM Activists aren't as universally despised, but they aren't taken very seriously because they tend to suck at science.
Ahh the fun part about being anti-government:
If the government isn't perfect at all times this means you can imply the government sucks at everything.
Never mind the fact that no non-governmental entity has even gotten close to getting a spacecraft to Mars, or even further then the space station, that it was a private entity that made the mistake, or that several dozen other missions to Mars have gone off without as hitch. You get to bitch about the government, which means Republicans get to advocate for lowering taxes by firing people, and nobody will ever go to Mars again because there's no money in it.
Except the Chinese. Real smart strategy there, giving the Chinese the whole damn Solar System.
Government profitability really depends on the industry.
In Detroit, for example, the currently out-of-money City actually runs the Water Department for most of the region. It almost always turns a profit. Government-run utilities generally either break even or turn a profit.
In the late Clinton years the Feds were turning a profit (or, as it's known in government circles, "running a surplus"), the problem was that we chose to elect a Republican Congress and weren't terribly emphatic in our choice of Al Gore, so knee-jerk anti-tax Crusaders from the Right took over everything and cut taxes.
A major upside is cost.
Most of the US's per capita income advantage is eaten by our much higher health spending. Our government actually spends more, per capita, on healthcare then the British government despite the fact that it only provides health services to vets, government employees, the very poor (in Ohio you can't get on Medicaid if you are above 100% poverty. ie: can afford to eat), and seniors. Including private spending, you guys spend 9.3% of GDP on health care, whereas the US spends 17.9%. We get some convenience for the very rich with that kind of spending, but many people (such as myself) will never even get on a waiting list to see a Doctor because we don't have insurance, we don't have money, and the insurance system in the US is set up so it's very difficult for US doctors to give discounts to people because they're poor. The downsides of the British system do not show up in any measure of general health, and for specific diseases there are methodological issues.
In other words we could cut taxes, and not experience any reduction in lifespan or other measures of health-care, if we implemented the NHS in the US. But it will never happen because political power in the US so diffuse that nobody could simply order all Doctors to change their private practices into government offices.
The food in the US of A is far from being the safest in the world. With rampant antibiotics use, designer pesticides (Hi Monsanto!), pink paste and high-fructose corn syrup, things aren't looking so good.
Fun fact: the stuff that Mickey D makes its "hamburgers" out of? Yeah. You have to have a license to use it, it's so dangerous...
I think it is worth noting though that the main thrust of criticism is not that Gladwell's writing lacks facts, it is instead that they take issue with how he draws conclusions and oversimplification.
Cause saying that oversimplification (a process that by definition MUST not only discard, but also ignore facts) is somehow an alternative to lacking facts sounds exactly like something Malcolm Gladwell would say.
Just like presenting false conclusions and oversimplification as a "lesser sin".
"No, no, no... They don't say his writing lacks facts to back it up. They only have issues with the fact that he's drawing conclusions out of his ass and making up a 'better' version of facts cause he didn't understand the original, boring ones."
And no... that's not the "main thrust of criticism". THAT is just the criticism aimed at his books.
Criticism of Gladwell is more extensive.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
I'd gladly give up the Mars skycrane if it meant an end of humiliation before I got on a plane. I am mildly handicapped, for me it is humiliating getting searched by those TSA scum.
Now I only fly when I absolutely must (exactly once since the Rape Scans/groping procedures went in), instead of frequently and for pleasure. The world has gotten smaller, for me. I hate this road we are traveling.
The practical point of these detectors is probably a cover for racial and ethnic profiling, not anything the actual detectors actually do.
That's an interesting theory, and I think it probably has some merit. That exposes another possible theory as well - much like dowsers, it might enable the person to get over any hangups and let their 'subconcious' point out anything suspicious?
Note: I still think a functioning bomb detector would be better; A properly trained dog is still the best explosives detector, but a lot of Middle Eastern types think dogs are unclean and won't work with them.
I don't read AC A human right
Solution: More bomb sniffing dogs. Besides the dogs are more intimidating than a machine anyways.
All those FDA approved food additives are are fine.
The scanners the TSA uses are safe and effective.
Putting millions on subsidized healthcare and ensuring even more of the incidental costs are hidden from consumers will reduce healthcare spending.
There was no coup in Egypt ...
One of those, the third one specifically, stands out as not fitting the theme.
You do realise it's the *same government* that has given us the TSA, the FDA, and the many other ruinous mistakes in every area it's involved in that you expect is magically going to take charge of health care and make us all better?
Surely you jest.
This is also the same government that put a lander on Mars with a sky crane and created the internet. And how come the FDA doesn't get credit for making food and drugs in the USA among the safest in the world?
I'm going to need a source on that. Food and drug in the US is pretty messed up. We spend some of the least amount of money per capita on food among developed countries and I have not read anywhere that food and drugs in the USA are among the safest in the world. Of course, food and drug in the US compares favorably to that of nations where widespread poverty is an issue, but I don't think that's a fair comparison. Many of the FDA regulations are heavily influenced by industry: the very people they are supposed to regulate. Meanwhile, I'd argue that similar organizations in Europe are much more rigorous in their approval process.
I am not anti-government, but I do think certain parts of it, especially the TSA and FDA, are doing inexcusably terrible jobs. A bad FDA is better than no FDA at all, but in a world where the internet is so prevalant and consumers and constantly asking for more transparency in all aspects of their lives, the FDA's regulations are rife with many loopsholes that allow food and drug to be extraordinarily opaque. Vitamins and supplements are barely regulated at all. And the TSA overspends on ineffective security measure after ineffective security measure, meanwhile trying its very hardest to keep improving public opinion of itself and covering up mistakes, rather than admitting fault when they've earned it and otherwise letting their work speak for itself.
And yes, you can absolutely judge Microsoft for Windows 8, one of their flagship products. Yes, I'd argue that with Windows 8, they have shown a significant problem in their ability to craft a UI people are happy with. Whether or not Microsoft is good at business itself remains to be seen; if Windows 8 is a commercial success, and doesn't adversely affect their future business, then Microsoft did well.
And yes, if you spend $38 million on bomb detectors don't work, when you would have argueably been better of spending the $38 million on flashlights so that at least you aren't fooling people into thinking they are safe when they are not, the government deserves to be criticized.
If you ask me Fraud is not good enough, treason would be a much better charge. OR we could sick him in a patch of several explosive devices some real some not and give him one of his own worthless devices to find his way through.
It was designed to liberate taxpayer money from the taxpayer, and give it to the well connected military supply corporations.
This has been known for months and months and months. Why report on it now?
There's probably an Egyptian tomb with it carved in hieroglyphics (may be a poor example ; I'm not sure that the Egyptians really "did" money ; perhaps s/Egyptians/Babylonians/ and s/hieroglyphics/cuneiform/ .)
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"