The heat is not exactly a wasted byproduct. An internal combustion engine is a way to transfer chemical energy into thermal(heat) energy into linear energy into rotational energy. A Wankel skips the linear energy step. The heat is important, because although you can run an engine off "cryogenic" power, for example using liquid nitrogen as fuel, what you are doing there is taking something very cold, and as it warms due to its environment you harness the energy of its expansion. Similar to an external combustion engine. These are both very ineffective; Google it if you like. If you could use all the thermal energy from combustion, the exhaust and engine would be cool to the touch, no matter how long it ran. Good luck with that. That isn't what is happening here, which is either a reporter making changes to the story in order to show the subject in a more favorable light, or a reporter making mistakes. Either way, the reporter is not a subject matter expert, and is screwing things up; it happens.
I have had engines I referred to as "cold blooded" before, generally because they were built so heavily that it took forever (one was over half a god damn hour) for them to warm up to peak operating temperatures, and you got no power or reliability out of them until then. These engines pissed me off. If you want one, look for a small displacement (less than 300cc) "universal Japanese model" motorcycle from the 70's. There are lots of other places too, but that is a reliable, inexpensive source.
Pressure and heat are very closely related. A diesel works by creating enough thermal energy through pressure on the fuel to cause it to spontaneously combust, which vastly increases the temperature, which increases the pressure enough to drive the pistons through their power cycle. Replace the pressure induced heat with an electric spark and you have a gasoline engine. The thermal energy is still the integral part of the operation of the engine.
As far as no byproducts, the only way you are going to ever end up with no physical byproducts would be a 100% efficient nuclear reaction (again, good luck with that), during which you would expect large quantities of some form of energy, most likely thermal energy, electromagnetic radiation, and light. No harmful byproducts, on the other hand, could be as simple as water, in the case of hydrogen power, but is likely claimed to be water and CO2 for this stuff. In reality, there would be some carbon monoxide and nitrous oxide too, just because that stuff gets everywhere, and unburned hydrocarbons.
The idea that there would be no heat from this fuel source's combustion is silly at best, and certainly wouldn't be a selling point as a gasoline replacement even if true, but the idea that it burns much cleaner than petroleum based fuels is both likely and laudable. If the whole thing isn't a sham, which is possible.
I've read several articles saying that the best quality modern violins are as good or better than Strads anyway, but I can't don't remember where. I'll keep looking. In the mean time, this article from a few years ago has a different theory on the cause of the sound, and also makes the claim that in blind tests people often can't tell the difference (look about 2/3 down)
My personal opinion is that Stradivarius was just an exceptionally good artisan who worked with the best materials he could find, and made an excellent product. Modern manufacturers can do as well, or better.
My first violin instructor was definitely all about the magic of Stradivarius, and a much better player than I am now, so who am I to say.
You don't have to join an organization to critique it. If somebody wants to critique the military, that's fine. I would just prefer if they weren't completely wrong in the factual part of their assessment. If he had said the Taliban were reasonable moderate people, of great value to the world in general, all heroes, scholars and gentlemen, I would disagree with that, too. I like to disagree with people who are wrong; that's how I roll.
If the US government folded up shop and left, unless another relatively easy-going democracy took its place, you would almost instantly lose your right to freedom of speech. Most countries, even ones people hold as paragons of civil liberty, for example the British with their health care, don't have it except as a gentleman's agreement. Our forefathers may have created the government to safeguard their rights, that is not at issue, what I am saying is that as of yet the government is doing an acceptable (by no means perfect) job of it, and you seem to disagree. Unless saying the government is the biggest threat to your civil liberties is a statement I am misreading somehow?
The big reason Nader had a hard time in his bid was because our voting system strongly favors two relatively moderate parties, and he is an extremist. Could that possibly be at least part of the trouble Debs had?
I am currently enlisted in the Navy and I have Top Secret clearance. You might be on a list. That is true. But who cares? Just putting that out there.
I think Thoreau's vast military experience makes him the ideal person to get perspective from. Awesome. Thanks.
The biggest threat to your right to whine is the US government, the same group, in fact, that established your right to whine in the first place. Well thought out.
I guess you are just such a radical that the FBI has set up an observation post in your neighbor's house, just another instance of the man trying to keep you down. Well, you showed them, you posted what may be Thoreau's most retarded horse shit on slashdot. Slipped it right in under your government censors' collective noses, despite their constant vigilance and evil intentions. Congratulations.
The change in ice volume as related by the article did not create the northwest passage, it merely made it shorter, which I had already said. That is how it is irrelevant to the thread.
Maybe being vitriolic is the same as being right, but I don't feel like getting all emotional about global economics today. But kudos for your apt boiler metaphor. It doesn't have any logical symbolism for anything actually happening, but kudos, none the less.
Let me lay it down for you: 1. Established economy countries (re: USA) are giving growing economy countries (re: China) many, many industrial contracts, and thus lots of money. They are doing this because even though it is lots of money, it is less than the cost of doing things in-house. What a growing economy needs to grow is lots of money. By sending this industry to these growing economies, we accelerate their growth. Eventually, all economies will be established, and then this practice will dissapear. 2. Although it may be that specialization is no longer as important as scale increases, the fact is that many countries lack certain natural resources, such as iron or gold, and must therefore trade for them. Should there be artificial limits placed on what people are allowed to import so some pompous ass can feel satisfied that all these individual countries are sustainable, even though some live in filthy hovels as a direct result of it? Maybe we should force them to form bigger countries. It would take a lot of war, but I guess it would be worth it, right? 3. The evil corporate overlord worldwide plutocracy is a straw man. There is no reason to assume that they would be a result of globalization. The long term result of globalization would see that more efficient, agile, locally run companies and corporations would tend to outperform their unwieldy international counterparts as soon as the wage disparity between nations narrows; there is no reason to go overseas if you can't get cheap labor there, and it increases costs. The reason to import products will be personal choice regarding engineering and design decisions, better prices due to manufacturing differences, or because something won't grow or otherwise can't be found where you live. 4. Fossil fuels, as freely traded commodities are, by definition, not undervalued. Yes, they will run out, they are already trending towards scarcity. As this happens, the value of alternative energy sources will rise, and research and development of said alternatives will increase. Plastics can already be made from corn, and hydrogen could prove to be an efficient storage and transfer medium for nuclear power, which although not sustainable, could probably see us through a few hundred years. There is no crisis there. 5. . . Human costs. Maybe if Nike didn't give some Indonesians crappy jobs manufacturing shoes thier lives would be better. If so, I don't see how. I suppose Nike could cut their advertising budget in half and improve wages, but as I understand it Indonesia is setting a cap on how much they can pay their workers anyway. So, somehow, by Nike being forced to fire all these people and move their factories back to the US, these Indonesians are going to have better lives? Without foriegn money being poured in, their economy is going to grow just as fast as it is now, or maybe faster? I'm not going to say it's impossible, but it seems pretty unlikely, and I certainly don't see how it would work. 6. Autonomy. If we simply get out of the way, stop encouraging or discouraging globalization, things go my way. If we run into the situation with spools of red tape and political diatribes things become a mess, and never actually get to the way I think you want them to be. If there was a clear advantage to your . . . whatever it is you actually want to do, it might be worth thinking about. (how do we increase the wealth of other nations as well as lowering the human cost?) I do not pretend what we have is perfect, but we may be doing the best we can with the situation we have been handed. Without knowing what it is you actually propose we do, I can't say that with any assurity. 7. Melting ice caps is a change, but who is to say whether or not it is a problem. For every displaced Eskimo there may be a dozen better fed Chinese. Time will tell.
Yeah. If I was talking about ice volume, it is a big change. Too bad the thread was concerning the Northwest Passage.
Non ice-breaker traversals of the NW passage - 10 years ago: If you planned it right and went during the summer you probably made it. This year: If you planned it right and went during the summer you probably made it. Wow. What a huge, mind boggling difference. I bow to your superior intellect.
Hey, why don't you post some quotes from the article summary at me to show me how wrong I was about my interpretation of TFA in regards to the navigability of the passage, you know, since that's what I was talking about. Ass.
The thing is, we used to have things as crappy as China (or wherever) here in the USA - and nobody flipped a switch that made things the way they are now; it happened gradually over many decades. I am not an economist or an anthropologist to tell you why exactly things are they way they are, but there is currently great disparity in the value of people's time in different countries. People in the US and many other countries with high hourly wages use this to their advantage; to not do so would be economically irresponsible.
I suspect we can agree that the current situation can not last. It is not sustainable, for us or them. However, that does not mean drastic measures must be taken. Things tend to work themselves out, especially in the long term.
As time goes on there will be gradual changes in China and the rest of the world, and eventually the disparity we feel now will tend to balance itself out, in no small part because of the exploitation of the current discrepancy; invisible hand of the market and all that. The whole local products and services argument won't cut it: specialization is more efficient then subsistence, and specialization encourages/requires lively trade. Eventually, the world will act as a single economy, with wage equality and whatnot, and at that point "sustainable economies, centered around local products and services" will be unlikely unless you consider the entirety of human civilization "local".
Economic isolationism tends to slow the advancement of growing economies, and does nothing to resolve disparity in living conditions. The current incarnation of the global economy my seem, may even be, an orgy of waste and greed, but the long term result will not be the destruction of our respective economies or societies, but rather their fortification.
Unless we kill each other in a war; there is always that. But cheer up; we'll soon both be dead.
There have been over 110 private navigations (sans icebreaker). I know a guy who was trying to be #100 in a less than 40ft sailboat back in the early 90s.
Although it is getting to be more reliable now, it isn't like this is some big sudden change, and you still have to plan around seasonal ice.
I think the article was saying that the route is more direct this year than any previous year. Not really a headline grabber, since they could have been saying that almost every year they've been keeping track. (We finally beat the record set in 2005! Hooray!)
As far as the first amendment goes, no, this is not protected free speech; a privately run site can pretty much do what it likes in a situation like this. This is a case of legal censorship.
If it isn't censorship, what would you call it? Free speech?
I think you are stupid. -- free speech (true?)
I think white/black/arab/jewish/whatever people are inferior to my people, and unfit to live. -- free (hate) speech, expect to have a close eye on you
I have a bomb, I'm going to kill you all. -- free speech, also probable cause for search and seizure
The holocaust never happened -- free (stupid) speech
We have the right to free speech, and we also have the right to remain silent, these are not to be confused. If you implicate yourself in a crime, it isn't your speech that is criminal, nor should it be.
Before you get all weepy, I don't really think you are stupid; just wrong. Freedom of speech should mean freedom of speech. It isn't really that complicated a principle.
Did you pay for the receipt? Is it even yours? You have been shoplifting receipts all these years and you didn't even know it. It only looks like the guy excavating a nostril at the exit gate during a spare moment is putting a yellow streak down the receipt. He is really signing over store property to you. If you don't let him do that, you are stealing the receipt, and they have every right to search your bags, or your anal cavity, for other things you are probably stealing, you bastard.
In a few months, when shoplifting is declared an act of terrorism, just imagine the fun they'll have with you.
That's pretty much the point. By refusing the search you aren't breaking a law, you are breaking a membership condition, and your membership can be rescinded.
I suppose if they have the staff for it they could physically detain you and have a citizen's arrest, or something like that. I would guess that this is more when you set off an exit alarm and try to pull a runner than when you don't let them search your bag . . . Maybe they could declare you a terrorist and shoot you in the face, and then plant something on you from the wholesale bombs department.
Legitimately walk into the store with the items and a receipt, intending to return them, they say you can't, so you walk out of the store with the same items.
As far as the yellow marker guy is concerned, it would look the same as if you walked in, snatched some stuff of the shelves that you had a marked receipt for, and simply walked out.
Don't think of them as public roads. Think of them as private roads owned by the government, which is like a club with huge dues that consistently ignores its charter because membership is close enough to mandatory that it makes no difference. Then it all makes sense.
What tools are these you speak of? When I think of climate modeling, I am not thinking about modeling the correlation between CO2 and global temperature, which so far as I know is a best fit graph on the recent history of atmostpheric CO2 and global temperature extrapolated into the future (that I could do on a graphing calculator in a couple minutes), I'm thinking of modeling the effects of global temperature increases on existing weather patterns, or ocean currents, or something on those lines, and I'm pretty sure that is what Dyson was talking about too.
On issues as complicated as those, there is generally no accepted consensus, and although it is nearly inevitable that somebody is right, how many more are wrong? When the media picks up on something like "OMG ATLANTIC HURRICANES!!!!!!!!" and then we don't have any for a couple years, it looks bad, even if it was just a small group of climatologists making the claims. That being said, where was the scholastic outroar when people ran their models and found these claims to be faulty? Could that be because the models were unreliable enough that nobody was sure? I'd blame the media, but I suspect Fox news would have loved a story about how "Global Warming Reduces Frequency and Intensity of Atlantic Hurricanes!!!" Doesn't seem a tool that can't decide between "more" and "less" for weather events as large, and potentially important, as hurricanes would be a reliable predictor.
In all seriousness, what are they prediciting with these useful, reliable tools of thiers from the 80's, or even the more contemporary models? I honestly don't know.
I must have misunderstood you. "If either [climate models are useless, or climatologists are not "real scientists"] were true, science would be reduced to a series of anecdotes passed down by old people trying to sell books."
If that is what you really meant, the irony is rich. Dyson is using "ad-homs on strawman climatologists" and that is bad, because he's arrogant and if what he says is true science is a ploy by the book sales department of the AARP.
I'm sure your ad-homs on strawman "old people" cut him to the quick.
That being said, I'll bet laymen gave (or would have given, had they known about the project) Oppenheimer a bunch of shit about how he wasn't a real scientist, or Nuclear physics wasn't real science, until his bombs started working. When climatologists make some models that are reliable prediction tools people who don't know what they are talking about will probably shut up. That doesn't mean the current models have any more validity than a faulty design for a nuclear bomb.
I prefer to think of them as retarded security measures, rather than draconian. Bringing toothpaste or mouthwash on an aircraft makes people die, so they take it from you at a screening point = retarded. Stuffing the toothpaste tube into your urethra and impaling you in front of terminal B, as a warning to others tempted by oral hygiene = draconian. Or I guess that would be both retarded and draconian. Whatever.
Either way, it doesn't have much to do with copyright litigation.
Judging by your responses, I suspect I agree with you on most of these issues. I certainly don't believe Republicans (or democrats, or [insert other political party here]) have anyone's but their own interests at heart, and I am well aware of the vast amount of hypocracy involved in campaigning.
My objection was more towards the way your views were presented. For example, I don't have a problem with the current abortion rules. I don't think that abortion is a constitutional issue, so legally speaking that leaves it up to states to decide. Ideally, states would all decide to use the current guidelines to make thier laws. This would probably not be the case, but abortion is outside the federal mandate, so what I would prefer for states that I can't vote in is immaterial.
In the research projects I participated in (none were medical) the way we worked was to start a project with volunteers, more or less, and then ask the school(government money) and related industry(private money) for grants when we had enough to make a good proposal. Saying we couldn't get funds from the university itself would have been inconvenient, but not crippling. Besides the technicality that cutting off funding is != banning, and any patents would probably be sold off to Pfizer, or somebody like them, and the end result to you is no different.
I was actually operating under the assumption that Ron Paul was a flight surgeon, not an obstetrician. I guess he was both. Colmes is a Fox news pundit (unless this is some other Colmes I'm not aware of), and if you can think of somebody who's opinion I should think less of, I would like to hear it. My point was that the abortion debate is not about human rights, but about the very definition of human, which is currently (as related to abortion) set forth rationally in a series of trimesters and whatnot, by the supreme court decision of Roe vs. Wade, in a decision that was heavily influenced by consultation with [people who aren't asshole pundits on cable TV, but medical doctors, much more similar to Ron Paul than Colmes]. For an MD to say the fetus is viable and therefore has rights is worth listening to, if certainly not worth blindly following, especially not without hearing the reasoning behind it. If the fetus is viable, it has all human rights; equal to any other human. That is kind of the point of rights.
I could be wrong, because I don't pay real close attention, but I thought
1)Ron Paul's stance on abortion is that it isn't a federal issue, and should be up to the states to decide. Which I think is right, the way things stand. I don't have a problem with the outcome of Roe vs. Wade, but I very much disagree with the way they got it. If it has to be a constitutional issue, make a damned amendment. That being said, Ron Paul is more qualified to have an opinion on this matter than Colmes is by FAR, and as the comment said, he didn't really expand on the why of it.
2)Ron Paul voted against the Patriot Act.
3)Ron Paul voted against the Iraq war.
4)Stem cell research has not been banned; government funding for stem cell research has been ended. Maybe I don't understand the way university research projects work, but I would think that would intimate going to private institutions for funding would solve the problem. It isn't like any cures (or whatever) found were going to be public domain anyway, so why is the government funding any of this stuff?
5)Gay marriage . . . Well, the right thing to do, I think, would be to end all government recognition of marriage at all. Marriage should be by the consent of the people directly involved: [priest, rabbi, minister, judge, captain, Elvis impersonator, whoever], and the people getting married, however many there are of whatever sexes. It should be a personal issue, not a political campaign point. The idea that the government needs to allow, recognize, or reward any marriage at all is spurious. Good luck finding a candidate with that belief though.
Unrelated to Ron Paul, I would like to point out that the idea that being "pro life" is restrictive of rights is retarded. Pro-life believes that the fetus is viable; a living human being, with rights. If this is the case, abortion is murder. Pro-choice views the fetus (legally, if not literally) as an appendix; a part of somebody that they want removed. The debate should not be degraded into a matter of civil rights, because whether or not something is a human individual is a medical matter. I realize that people on both sides of the debate misconstrue not only the opposing side, but their own side, through both avarice and ignorance, and although this may provide the cunning debater an opportunity to smash their arguments, it does not invalidate the viewpoint. When a doctor stands up and says "abortion is murder" I listen just as closely as when one supports the procedure. If you are not an MD or at least a Ph. D in some related field, like biology, I don't give a shit what you think on this issue, and neither should anybody else. That being said, the supreme court did indeed consult with several doctors while formulating the verdict for the Roe vs. Wade trial, and the results reflect that. After a certain point in development, the fetus is viable, and no longer subject to abortions (with exceptions, apparently, for disturbing procedures like partial birth abortions). This does not excuse the fact that calling abortion a constitutional issue is, at best, a stretch.
Assuming that global warming, acting through high sea surface temperatures, is increasing the intensity of hurricanes, I find this to be an odd statement:
"However, most regions around the world will not experience more storms. The only exception to this is the North Atlantic, where hurricanes have become both more numerous and longer-lasting in recent years, especially since 1995."
Why is it not having the same effect in all places where the sea is warmer? I would have thought there would be increased activity for the Pacific as well. I still haven't found any data on that, but it doesn't exactly support the point they are trying to make.
I also note that your article was responsible enough to point out that there is no overwhelming scientific consensus in this matter, which means we can persue our different opinions without either of us being unreasonable.
Regardless, I am not trying to form public policy, and I don't care enough about my fellow man to tell them to stop driving SUV's so they don't get washed into the atlantic by hurricanes, or drowned by rising sea levels, or what ever else global warming is supposed to kill us with. What I'm saying is, "too late" isn't really a concept that bothers me here. If the only way to get proof that global warming is affecting hurricanes, or otherwise going to kill us all, is to have some global warming and see what happens, I propose that this is a necessity for the sake of science. Think of what we could learn, all for the low price of people paying for thier mistakes.
Okay Mr. Wizard, what is your basis for saying global warming has anything to do with hurricanes? Just because? All I'm looking for is some sort of data to verify the position, and I don't see any.
Could some form of global warming contribute meaningfully to the formation of hurricanes? Certainly; it isn't impossible. That doesn't mean I see any evidence that it is actually happening. Is there any reason whatsoever to believe that it has? I don't see it. Honestly, I didn't have an opinion on this 3 days ago, and I don't have a lot of emotion invested in the opinion I have formed up to this point. Enlighten me, I'm happy to change my mind when confronted with new information.
While you're at it, you can explain my strawman to me, too. Unless you're saying that my arguement is faulty because I used sarcasm and hyperbole to paraphrase it at the end? How about this then: "I mean, clearly Hurricanes are affected by global warming." Better?
Slashdot Mirror
The heat is not exactly a wasted byproduct. An internal combustion engine is a way to transfer chemical energy into thermal(heat) energy into linear energy into rotational energy. A Wankel skips the linear energy step. The heat is important, because although you can run an engine off "cryogenic" power, for example using liquid nitrogen as fuel, what you are doing there is taking something very cold, and as it warms due to its environment you harness the energy of its expansion. Similar to an external combustion engine. These are both very ineffective; Google it if you like. If you could use all the thermal energy from combustion, the exhaust and engine would be cool to the touch, no matter how long it ran. Good luck with that. That isn't what is happening here, which is either a reporter making changes to the story in order to show the subject in a more favorable light, or a reporter making mistakes. Either way, the reporter is not a subject matter expert, and is screwing things up; it happens.
I have had engines I referred to as "cold blooded" before, generally because they were built so heavily that it took forever (one was over half a god damn hour) for them to warm up to peak operating temperatures, and you got no power or reliability out of them until then. These engines pissed me off. If you want one, look for a small displacement (less than 300cc) "universal Japanese model" motorcycle from the 70's. There are lots of other places too, but that is a reliable, inexpensive source.
Pressure and heat are very closely related. A diesel works by creating enough thermal energy through pressure on the fuel to cause it to spontaneously combust, which vastly increases the temperature, which increases the pressure enough to drive the pistons through their power cycle. Replace the pressure induced heat with an electric spark and you have a gasoline engine. The thermal energy is still the integral part of the operation of the engine.
As far as no byproducts, the only way you are going to ever end up with no physical byproducts would be a 100% efficient nuclear reaction (again, good luck with that), during which you would expect large quantities of some form of energy, most likely thermal energy, electromagnetic radiation, and light. No harmful byproducts, on the other hand, could be as simple as water, in the case of hydrogen power, but is likely claimed to be water and CO2 for this stuff. In reality, there would be some carbon monoxide and nitrous oxide too, just because that stuff gets everywhere, and unburned hydrocarbons.
The idea that there would be no heat from this fuel source's combustion is silly at best, and certainly wouldn't be a selling point as a gasoline replacement even if true, but the idea that it burns much cleaner than petroleum based fuels is both likely and laudable. If the whole thing isn't a sham, which is possible.
I've read several articles saying that the best quality modern violins are as good or better than Strads anyway, but I can't don't remember where. I'll keep looking. In the mean time, this article from a few years ago has a different theory on the cause of the sound, and also makes the claim that in blind tests people often can't tell the difference (look about 2/3 down)
http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/061129_violin_treatment.html
My personal opinion is that Stradivarius was just an exceptionally good artisan who worked with the best materials he could find, and made an excellent product. Modern manufacturers can do as well, or better.
My first violin instructor was definitely all about the magic of Stradivarius, and a much better player than I am now, so who am I to say.
You don't have to join an organization to critique it. If somebody wants to critique the military, that's fine. I would just prefer if they weren't completely wrong in the factual part of their assessment. If he had said the Taliban were reasonable moderate people, of great value to the world in general, all heroes, scholars and gentlemen, I would disagree with that, too. I like to disagree with people who are wrong; that's how I roll.
If the US government folded up shop and left, unless another relatively easy-going democracy took its place, you would almost instantly lose your right to freedom of speech. Most countries, even ones people hold as paragons of civil liberty, for example the British with their health care, don't have it except as a gentleman's agreement. Our forefathers may have created the government to safeguard their rights, that is not at issue, what I am saying is that as of yet the government is doing an acceptable (by no means perfect) job of it, and you seem to disagree. Unless saying the government is the biggest threat to your civil liberties is a statement I am misreading somehow?
The big reason Nader had a hard time in his bid was because our voting system strongly favors two relatively moderate parties, and he is an extremist. Could that possibly be at least part of the trouble Debs had?
I am currently enlisted in the Navy and I have Top Secret clearance. You might be on a list. That is true. But who cares? Just putting that out there.
I think Thoreau's vast military experience makes him the ideal person to get perspective from. Awesome. Thanks.
The biggest threat to your right to whine is the US government, the same group, in fact, that established your right to whine in the first place. Well thought out.
I guess you are just such a radical that the FBI has set up an observation post in your neighbor's house, just another instance of the man trying to keep you down. Well, you showed them, you posted what may be Thoreau's most retarded horse shit on slashdot. Slipped it right in under your government censors' collective noses, despite their constant vigilance and evil intentions. Congratulations.
but I sure was acting like it.
The change in ice volume as related by the article did not create the northwest passage, it merely made it shorter, which I had already said. That is how it is irrelevant to the thread.
Maybe being vitriolic is the same as being right, but I don't feel like getting all emotional about global economics today. But kudos for your apt boiler metaphor. It doesn't have any logical symbolism for anything actually happening, but kudos, none the less.
Let me lay it down for you:
1. Established economy countries (re: USA) are giving growing economy countries (re: China) many, many industrial contracts, and thus lots of money. They are doing this because even though it is lots of money, it is less than the cost of doing things in-house. What a growing economy needs to grow is lots of money. By sending this industry to these growing economies, we accelerate their growth. Eventually, all economies will be established, and then this practice will dissapear.
2. Although it may be that specialization is no longer as important as scale increases, the fact is that many countries lack certain natural resources, such as iron or gold, and must therefore trade for them. Should there be artificial limits placed on what people are allowed to import so some pompous ass can feel satisfied that all these individual countries are sustainable, even though some live in filthy hovels as a direct result of it? Maybe we should force them to form bigger countries. It would take a lot of war, but I guess it would be worth it, right?
3. The evil corporate overlord worldwide plutocracy is a straw man. There is no reason to assume that they would be a result of globalization. The long term result of globalization would see that more efficient, agile, locally run companies and corporations would tend to outperform their unwieldy international counterparts as soon as the wage disparity between nations narrows; there is no reason to go overseas if you can't get cheap labor there, and it increases costs. The reason to import products will be personal choice regarding engineering and design decisions, better prices due to manufacturing differences, or because something won't grow or otherwise can't be found where you live.
4. Fossil fuels, as freely traded commodities are, by definition, not undervalued. Yes, they will run out, they are already trending towards scarcity. As this happens, the value of alternative energy sources will rise, and research and development of said alternatives will increase. Plastics can already be made from corn, and hydrogen could prove to be an efficient storage and transfer medium for nuclear power, which although not sustainable, could probably see us through a few hundred years. There is no crisis there.
5. . . Human costs. Maybe if Nike didn't give some Indonesians crappy jobs manufacturing shoes thier lives would be better. If so, I don't see how. I suppose Nike could cut their advertising budget in half and improve wages, but as I understand it Indonesia is setting a cap on how much they can pay their workers anyway. So, somehow, by Nike being forced to fire all these people and move their factories back to the US, these Indonesians are going to have better lives? Without foriegn money being poured in, their economy is going to grow just as fast as it is now, or maybe faster? I'm not going to say it's impossible, but it seems pretty unlikely, and I certainly don't see how it would work.
6. Autonomy. If we simply get out of the way, stop encouraging or discouraging globalization, things go my way. If we run into the situation with spools of red tape and political diatribes things become a mess, and never actually get to the way I think you want them to be. If there was a clear advantage to your . . . whatever it is you actually want to do, it might be worth thinking about. (how do we increase the wealth of other nations as well as lowering the human cost?) I do not pretend what we have is perfect, but we may be doing the best we can with the situation we have been handed. Without knowing what it is you actually propose we do, I can't say that with any assurity.
7. Melting ice caps is a change, but who is to say whether or not it is a problem. For every displaced Eskimo there may be a dozen better fed Chinese. Time will tell.
Yeah. If I was talking about ice volume, it is a big change. Too bad the thread was concerning the Northwest Passage.
Non ice-breaker traversals of the NW passage -
10 years ago: If you planned it right and went during the summer you probably made it.
This year: If you planned it right and went during the summer you probably made it.
Wow. What a huge, mind boggling difference. I bow to your superior intellect.
Hey, why don't you post some quotes from the article summary at me to show me how wrong I was about my interpretation of TFA in regards to the navigability of the passage, you know, since that's what I was talking about. Ass.
The thing is, we used to have things as crappy as China (or wherever) here in the USA - and nobody flipped a switch that made things the way they are now; it happened gradually over many decades. I am not an economist or an anthropologist to tell you why exactly things are they way they are, but there is currently great disparity in the value of people's time in different countries. People in the US and many other countries with high hourly wages use this to their advantage; to not do so would be economically irresponsible.
I suspect we can agree that the current situation can not last. It is not sustainable, for us or them. However, that does not mean drastic measures must be taken. Things tend to work themselves out, especially in the long term.
As time goes on there will be gradual changes in China and the rest of the world, and eventually the disparity we feel now will tend to balance itself out, in no small part because of the exploitation of the current discrepancy; invisible hand of the market and all that. The whole local products and services argument won't cut it: specialization is more efficient then subsistence, and specialization encourages/requires lively trade. Eventually, the world will act as a single economy, with wage equality and whatnot, and at that point "sustainable economies, centered around local products and services" will be unlikely unless you consider the entirety of human civilization "local".
Economic isolationism tends to slow the advancement of growing economies, and does nothing to resolve disparity in living conditions. The current incarnation of the global economy my seem, may even be, an orgy of waste and greed, but the long term result will not be the destruction of our respective economies or societies, but rather their fortification.
Unless we kill each other in a war; there is always that. But cheer up; we'll soon both be dead.
There have been over 110 private navigations (sans icebreaker). I know a guy who was trying to be #100 in a less than 40ft sailboat back in the early 90s.
Although it is getting to be more reliable now, it isn't like this is some big sudden change, and you still have to plan around seasonal ice.
I think the article was saying that the route is more direct this year than any previous year. Not really a headline grabber, since they could have been saying that almost every year they've been keeping track. (We finally beat the record set in 2005! Hooray!)
Because a Newton is fruit and cake?
As far as the first amendment goes, no, this is not protected free speech; a privately run site can pretty much do what it likes in a situation like this. This is a case of legal censorship.
If it isn't censorship, what would you call it? Free speech?
I think you are stupid. -- free speech (true?)
I think white/black/arab/jewish/whatever people are inferior to my people, and unfit to live. -- free (hate) speech, expect to have a close eye on you
I have a bomb, I'm going to kill you all. -- free speech, also probable cause for search and seizure
The holocaust never happened -- free (stupid) speech
We have the right to free speech, and we also have the right to remain silent, these are not to be confused. If you implicate yourself in a crime, it isn't your speech that is criminal, nor should it be.
Before you get all weepy, I don't really think you are stupid; just wrong. Freedom of speech should mean freedom of speech. It isn't really that complicated a principle.
Did you pay for the receipt? Is it even yours? You have been shoplifting receipts all these years and you didn't even know it. It only looks like the guy excavating a nostril at the exit gate during a spare moment is putting a yellow streak down the receipt. He is really signing over store property to you. If you don't let him do that, you are stealing the receipt, and they have every right to search your bags, or your anal cavity, for other things you are probably stealing, you bastard.
In a few months, when shoplifting is declared an act of terrorism, just imagine the fun they'll have with you.
That's pretty much the point. By refusing the search you aren't breaking a law, you are breaking a membership condition, and your membership can be rescinded.
I suppose if they have the staff for it they could physically detain you and have a citizen's arrest, or something like that. I would guess that this is more when you set off an exit alarm and try to pull a runner than when you don't let them search your bag . . . Maybe they could declare you a terrorist and shoot you in the face, and then plant something on you from the wholesale bombs department.
Legitimately walk into the store with the items and a receipt, intending to return them, they say you can't, so you walk out of the store with the same items.
As far as the yellow marker guy is concerned, it would look the same as if you walked in, snatched some stuff of the shelves that you had a marked receipt for, and simply walked out.
Don't think of them as public roads. Think of them as private roads owned by the government, which is like a club with huge dues that consistently ignores its charter because membership is close enough to mandatory that it makes no difference. Then it all makes sense.
What tools are these you speak of? When I think of climate modeling, I am not thinking about modeling the correlation between CO2 and global temperature, which so far as I know is a best fit graph on the recent history of atmostpheric CO2 and global temperature extrapolated into the future (that I could do on a graphing calculator in a couple minutes), I'm thinking of modeling the effects of global temperature increases on existing weather patterns, or ocean currents, or something on those lines, and I'm pretty sure that is what Dyson was talking about too.
On issues as complicated as those, there is generally no accepted consensus, and although it is nearly inevitable that somebody is right, how many more are wrong? When the media picks up on something like "OMG ATLANTIC HURRICANES!!!!!!!!" and then we don't have any for a couple years, it looks bad, even if it was just a small group of climatologists making the claims. That being said, where was the scholastic outroar when people ran their models and found these claims to be faulty? Could that be because the models were unreliable enough that nobody was sure? I'd blame the media, but I suspect Fox news would have loved a story about how "Global Warming Reduces Frequency and Intensity of Atlantic Hurricanes!!!" Doesn't seem a tool that can't decide between "more" and "less" for weather events as large, and potentially important, as hurricanes would be a reliable predictor.
In all seriousness, what are they prediciting with these useful, reliable tools of thiers from the 80's, or even the more contemporary models? I honestly don't know.
I must have misunderstood you. "If either [climate models are useless, or climatologists are not "real scientists"] were true, science would be reduced to a series of anecdotes passed down by old people trying to sell books."
If that is what you really meant, the irony is rich. Dyson is using "ad-homs on strawman climatologists" and that is bad, because he's arrogant and if what he says is true science is a ploy by the book sales department of the AARP.
I'm sure your ad-homs on strawman "old people" cut him to the quick.
That being said, I'll bet laymen gave (or would have given, had they known about the project) Oppenheimer a bunch of shit about how he wasn't a real scientist, or Nuclear physics wasn't real science, until his bombs started working. When climatologists make some models that are reliable prediction tools people who don't know what they are talking about will probably shut up. That doesn't mean the current models have any more validity than a faulty design for a nuclear bomb.
I prefer to think of them as retarded security measures, rather than draconian. Bringing toothpaste or mouthwash on an aircraft makes people die, so they take it from you at a screening point = retarded. Stuffing the toothpaste tube into your urethra and impaling you in front of terminal B, as a warning to others tempted by oral hygiene = draconian. Or I guess that would be both retarded and draconian. Whatever.
Either way, it doesn't have much to do with copyright litigation.
Yeah. Things being faster is terrible.
Judging by your responses, I suspect I agree with you on most of these issues. I certainly don't believe Republicans (or democrats, or [insert other political party here]) have anyone's but their own interests at heart, and I am well aware of the vast amount of hypocracy involved in campaigning.
My objection was more towards the way your views were presented. For example, I don't have a problem with the current abortion rules. I don't think that abortion is a constitutional issue, so legally speaking that leaves it up to states to decide. Ideally, states would all decide to use the current guidelines to make thier laws. This would probably not be the case, but abortion is outside the federal mandate, so what I would prefer for states that I can't vote in is immaterial.
In the research projects I participated in (none were medical) the way we worked was to start a project with volunteers, more or less, and then ask the school(government money) and related industry(private money) for grants when we had enough to make a good proposal. Saying we couldn't get funds from the university itself would have been inconvenient, but not crippling. Besides the technicality that cutting off funding is != banning, and any patents would probably be sold off to Pfizer, or somebody like them, and the end result to you is no different.
I was actually operating under the assumption that Ron Paul was a flight surgeon, not an obstetrician. I guess he was both. Colmes is a Fox news pundit (unless this is some other Colmes I'm not aware of), and if you can think of somebody who's opinion I should think less of, I would like to hear it. My point was that the abortion debate is not about human rights, but about the very definition of human, which is currently (as related to abortion) set forth rationally in a series of trimesters and whatnot, by the supreme court decision of Roe vs. Wade, in a decision that was heavily influenced by consultation with [people who aren't asshole pundits on cable TV, but medical doctors, much more similar to Ron Paul than Colmes]. For an MD to say the fetus is viable and therefore has rights is worth listening to, if certainly not worth blindly following, especially not without hearing the reasoning behind it. If the fetus is viable, it has all human rights; equal to any other human. That is kind of the point of rights.
I could be wrong, because I don't pay real close attention, but I thought
1)Ron Paul's stance on abortion is that it isn't a federal issue, and should be up to the states to decide. Which I think is right, the way things stand. I don't have a problem with the outcome of Roe vs. Wade, but I very much disagree with the way they got it. If it has to be a constitutional issue, make a damned amendment. That being said, Ron Paul is more qualified to have an opinion on this matter than Colmes is by FAR, and as the comment said, he didn't really expand on the why of it.
2)Ron Paul voted against the Patriot Act.
3)Ron Paul voted against the Iraq war.
4)Stem cell research has not been banned; government funding for stem cell research has been ended. Maybe I don't understand the way university research projects work, but I would think that would intimate going to private institutions for funding would solve the problem. It isn't like any cures (or whatever) found were going to be public domain anyway, so why is the government funding any of this stuff?
5)Gay marriage . . . Well, the right thing to do, I think, would be to end all government recognition of marriage at all. Marriage should be by the consent of the people directly involved: [priest, rabbi, minister, judge, captain, Elvis impersonator, whoever], and the people getting married, however many there are of whatever sexes. It should be a personal issue, not a political campaign point. The idea that the government needs to allow, recognize, or reward any marriage at all is spurious. Good luck finding a candidate with that belief though.
Unrelated to Ron Paul, I would like to point out that the idea that being "pro life" is restrictive of rights is retarded. Pro-life believes that the fetus is viable; a living human being, with rights. If this is the case, abortion is murder. Pro-choice views the fetus (legally, if not literally) as an appendix; a part of somebody that they want removed. The debate should not be degraded into a matter of civil rights, because whether or not something is a human individual is a medical matter. I realize that people on both sides of the debate misconstrue not only the opposing side, but their own side, through both avarice and ignorance, and although this may provide the cunning debater an opportunity to smash their arguments, it does not invalidate the viewpoint. When a doctor stands up and says "abortion is murder" I listen just as closely as when one supports the procedure. If you are not an MD or at least a Ph. D in some related field, like biology, I don't give a shit what you think on this issue, and neither should anybody else. That being said, the supreme court did indeed consult with several doctors while formulating the verdict for the Roe vs. Wade trial, and the results reflect that. After a certain point in development, the fetus is viable, and no longer subject to abortions (with exceptions, apparently, for disturbing procedures like partial birth abortions). This does not excuse the fact that calling abortion a constitutional issue is, at best, a stretch.
I also note that your article was responsible enough to point out that there is no overwhelming scientific consensus in this matter, which means we can persue our different opinions without either of us being unreasonable.
Regardless, I am not trying to form public policy, and I don't care enough about my fellow man to tell them to stop driving SUV's so they don't get washed into the atlantic by hurricanes, or drowned by rising sea levels, or what ever else global warming is supposed to kill us with. What I'm saying is, "too late" isn't really a concept that bothers me here. If the only way to get proof that global warming is affecting hurricanes, or otherwise going to kill us all, is to have some global warming and see what happens, I propose that this is a necessity for the sake of science. Think of what we could learn, all for the low price of people paying for thier mistakes.
Okay Mr. Wizard, what is your basis for saying global warming has anything to do with hurricanes? Just because? All I'm looking for is some sort of data to verify the position, and I don't see any.
Could some form of global warming contribute meaningfully to the formation of hurricanes? Certainly; it isn't impossible. That doesn't mean I see any evidence that it is actually happening. Is there any reason whatsoever to believe that it has? I don't see it. Honestly, I didn't have an opinion on this 3 days ago, and I don't have a lot of emotion invested in the opinion I have formed up to this point. Enlighten me, I'm happy to change my mind when confronted with new information.
While you're at it, you can explain my strawman to me, too. Unless you're saying that my arguement is faulty because I used sarcasm and hyperbole to paraphrase it at the end? How about this then: "I mean, clearly Hurricanes are affected by global warming." Better?