Why your question? Perhaps you are not a fan of religion in general, or catholicism in particular? Like the rest of us, they probably believe every religion they don't belong to is misguided.
Unlike the rest of us, they have made the extraordinary decision to dedicate their lives completely to the service of others. If somehow a bias for altruism sneaks into some neurologic baseline, perhaps DSM-V will someday list greed as a psychosis. No other problems seem obvious to me.
I doubt monastic brains are hardwired for superstition any more than those of the general population. Of those slashdotters who believe that we are visited by extra-terrestrials, how many came to that conclusion based on the forensic evidence and proven physics?
I believe that underlying your comment is an assumption that public school employment is decided by a vibrant functioning marketplace. That assumption would be incorrect.
> Communities band together to protect their members I think that is exactly the heart of the matter.
> only until they have an excess, which we do. > Especially of stupid people I think this is what society struggles with today. It used to be that Nature purged our communities of the sick and the stupid for us, but we have to an extent defeated Nature here. As our civilization evolves, many of us feel that compassion demands we accomodate people's handicaps and try to equalize life for everybody. Which is very nice. Maybe not without negative consequences, but well-intended, and appreciated by my wheel-chair bound brother and my nephew with cerebral palsy.
As a society we have forgotten that we are part of Nature, and we believe our country to be a basically safe and civilized place. The citizenry believes that wherever they are, the government is supposed to make sure nothing bad happens, or fix it when it does. So we are programmed to call 911 when we get ourselves lost or in trouble, and we sue Parks & Rec when our kid falls off a boulder.
Popular over-reliance on the government (and governmental excesses of control) may be the price we pay for demanding a soft fuzzy world. Maybe we can't have it both ways.
> Government funded rescue services are good for actual emergencies, > but at that point it's going to be a medical emergency, and your > medical insurance ought to be covering part of it. Stupidity > insurance is something totally different.
Well put - I like cogent analysis.
But won't stupidity, left to itself, eventually become a medical emergency? I can imagine that first responders might not know if they are rescuing a well-prepared person who is going into shock, or some unprepared dolt who thought his GPS would order him pizza. An argument could be made that it's cheaper to rescue idiots before they are a medical emergency.
> However... your second paragraph is where I have problems. Me too. That was A Modest Proposal intended to show where that line of thinking could lead.
It's unfortunate that tech is enabling stupidity to get further into trouble, but I think the point of government should be to serve the citizenry, and I think that search and rescue is a valid government function. Medivac is expensive, but in the grand scheme of things that expense is nothing compared to, say, elective wars over false pretenses, or rescuing for-profit banks and corporations from their stupidity.
> don't provide them rescue services if they don't get the insurance first.
So impoverished people can go up the mountain, they just don't get rescue services? I guess that's sensible if you are a die-hard capitalist libertarian, but then why do we need the government to do the rescuing? Let the richer hikers contract with Blackwater or something, and let everybody know the government won't be helping anybody.
And if some little 3-year old toddler wanders off, she'd better have the sense to have been born in the upper middle class or have lots of friends, because the sheriff can't afford to waste resources on some stupid little girl when his deputies are so busy forcibly evicting bankrupt citizens from their homes.
It sounds like the supercomputer generated an algorithm for the smartphone to run. I guess they can call that "leveraging the power of a supercomputer" but implying the phone app is doing supercomputing stretches things a bit far. I call misleading headline.
>> Ice cores clearly show a CO2 lag to temperature, so we've refuted that
What I see at your link appears to show that historically, temperature increases weren't driven exclusively by CO2.
I don't see where it refutes the hypothesis that increasing atmospheric carbon causes temperatures to rise. In fact, FTA:
Any laymen will understand from [Al Gore's] statement that the ice-cores demonstrate a causal link, that higher amounts of CO2 give rise to higher temperatures. Of course, this could indeed be the case, and to some extent, it necessarily is.
The question before the house is whether increasing carbon increases temperatures, and the page you cite allows that possibility and admits "to some extent" that reality.
I don't think you have refuted the GW hypothesis, you've only shown that spikes in temperature have happened without a preceding spike in CO2.
> it first must be stated as a falsifiable hypothesis For GW, how about
"Significantly increasing the amount of carbon in the atmosphere causes global temperatures to rise"
After proving that, for AGW test
"Human activity has caused a significant net increase of carbon in the atmosphere".
For catastrophic AGW, pick your catastrophe:
"Increased global temperature causes polar ice to melt and sea levels to rise."
"Increased global temperature causes more intense weather events."
"Increased global temperature makes individual habitats unsuitable for their installed base"
> the AGW dodge is always about "the preponderance" of the evidence, > neatly avoiding any refutation by pretending that science is some > sort of democracy with majority rule.
Ah, the logical fallacy we call "the straw man". You are the one that equated preponderance of evidence with preponderance of opinion.
And I would think their refutation has merit; the preponderant evidence deserves more weight than anomalies.
If their data is inaccurate, submit the corrections. If their logic is flawed, woops, never mind, you've demonstrated that's not your specialty. But if you can prove any of the hypotheses above to be false, please do. Until then, you contribute nothing but FUD, of which we have a surplus already.
> Apparently their problems include the NOAA-16 satellite too
I hope WISE scientists aren't up nights worrying about every sensor of everybody else's satellites.
Nor do hardware glitches support the allegation that climatology is a fraudulent global conspiracy. Such FUD works great in politics, but to disprove AGW, scientists need reproducible counter-evidence. Press releases about anomalous sensor readings shouldn't influence otherwise tech-savvy people like you.
> we need to get humanity established elsewhere Why "need"? In what way would the extinction of homo sapiens sapiens hurt the universe? Or the Earth? Or dead humans?
If mankind were gone, who but our surviving pets would miss us?
> somehow even spiritual I guess I can kind of imagine what you mean, but I can't relate. I've killed animals before and likely will again, but the feelings I get are a momentary thrill of success if it was a hunt, sorrow for the loss and remorse for what I've done, and a satiated belly if I eat it.
Historically, people deposited their money at a "bank" so that the bank would keep it secure for them, allowing them to be ignorant of security best practices and specialize in something productive.
Today, banks have somehow absolved themselves of responsibility for security, and have convinced us all to blame the customer for lapses in security, so much that we even call it by the oxymoron "identity theft" without feeling any irony.
Banks should authenticate the transaction, and allow their customers to talk about their pets and mother's maiden name on Facebook without jeopardizing their account. But blaming the victim is easier, and we all seem to go along with it unquestioningly.
There's some context to think about. The US entered WWII as a direct result of American soil being attacked. It was pretty clear that fighting back was a matter of national security. In that context it would be easy to make the case that a leaker of battlefield secrets was treasonous.
Since then we've only waged elective wars, generally for purposes that leave many of us scratching our heads in confusion. Who knows what the hell we invaded Iraq for. Our strategy there and in Afghanistan seems to be to drive around in Hummers until somebody shoots us, then chase 'em down and shoot 'em back. How that benefits our national security is a mystery to me. Maybe some of these leaked documents can clarify it.
Julian Assange also admits someday he's probably going to have "blood on his hands." He has put himself in a tough situation. But I'm betting the increased daylight will do more good than bad.
> nothing beats having the skills to do what you are doing Except perhaps doing new things, learning new skills, and taking whatever measures one deems prudent for comfort and safety while adventuring.
> a severe shortage of... [sufficiently bright people]... > with the skills and knowledge necessary to do battle
How many do we need? I submit that the number of brilliant hackers we need is quite small; if any shortage exists, it will be in the botnet, not the conference room.
> the bank isn't in a position to oversee any of this transaction. Huh? The bank is the one holding the money.
> How do you secure [a transaction] while actually letting Trent buy his gas? How do you secure a building while actually letting authorized personnel pass through?
Your question is interesting, but it's the bank's job to figure out. Or it would be if they were in the safeguarding-money business.
Think about your bank's "security" for a moment. "Authentication" consists of providing publicly available information like your zip code, or SSN, or mother's maiden name. When they really try hard you have to authenticate yourself with a four digit numeric PIN. Bank transaction security hasn't evolved one bit (even in the crypto sense) since the 1970's. If anything it's gotten more lax.
But to answer your question, one pretty good solution currently available is RSA dongles.
Interesting that this "insight from the banking industry" doesn't seem to indicate the banks have any responsibility for the problem.
There once was a time that people took their money to the bank for safekeeping. I think banks have partly weaseled themselves out of the security side of the business, and what used to be called "bank robbery" they now call "identity theft." Which works ok for the bank, seeing how it's the customer who lost the money and it must have been the customer's fault, or the gas station's, or the POS equipment vendor's.
The bank, which should act like a watchdog, portrays itself as something of an innocent bystander.
> Don't steal the fucking music in the first place Interesting point. But good luck convincing the RIAA - I doubt they'll ever stop stealing and fucking musicians.
Slashdot Mirror
Why your question? Perhaps you are not a fan of religion in general, or catholicism in particular? Like the rest of us, they probably believe every religion they don't belong to is misguided.
Unlike the rest of us, they have made the extraordinary decision to dedicate their lives completely to the service of others. If somehow a bias for altruism sneaks into some neurologic baseline, perhaps DSM-V will someday list greed as a psychosis. No other problems seem obvious to me.
I doubt monastic brains are hardwired for superstition any more than those of the general population. Of those slashdotters who believe that we are visited by extra-terrestrials, how many came to that conclusion based on the forensic evidence and proven physics?
I believe that underlying your comment is an assumption that public school employment is decided by a vibrant functioning marketplace. That assumption would be incorrect.
Because all targets of nonconsensual wiretaps should express themselves clearly for the sake of their eavesdroppers.
> Communities band together to protect their members
I think that is exactly the heart of the matter.
> only until they have an excess, which we do.
> Especially of stupid people
I think this is what society struggles with today. It used to be that Nature purged our communities of the sick and the stupid for us, but we have to an extent defeated Nature here. As our civilization evolves, many of us feel that compassion demands we accomodate people's handicaps and try to equalize life for everybody. Which is very nice. Maybe not without negative consequences, but well-intended, and appreciated by my wheel-chair bound brother and my nephew with cerebral palsy.
As a society we have forgotten that we are part of Nature, and we believe our country to be a basically safe and civilized place. The citizenry believes that wherever they are, the government is supposed to make sure nothing bad happens, or fix it when it does. So we are programmed to call 911 when we get ourselves lost or in trouble, and we sue Parks & Rec when our kid falls off a boulder.
Popular over-reliance on the government (and governmental excesses of control) may be the price we pay for demanding a soft fuzzy world. Maybe we can't have it both ways.
> Government funded rescue services are good for actual emergencies,
> but at that point it's going to be a medical emergency, and your
> medical insurance ought to be covering part of it. Stupidity
> insurance is something totally different.
Well put - I like cogent analysis.
But won't stupidity, left to itself, eventually become a medical emergency? I can imagine that first responders might not know if they are rescuing a well-prepared person who is going into shock, or some unprepared dolt who thought his GPS would order him pizza. An argument could be made that it's cheaper to rescue idiots before they are a medical emergency.
> However... your second paragraph is where I have problems.
Me too. That was A Modest Proposal intended to show where that line of thinking could lead.
It's unfortunate that tech is enabling stupidity to get further into trouble, but I think the point of government should be to serve the citizenry, and I think that search and rescue is a valid government function. Medivac is expensive, but in the grand scheme of things that expense is nothing compared to, say, elective wars over false pretenses, or rescuing for-profit banks and corporations from their stupidity.
> don't provide them rescue services if they don't get the insurance first.
So impoverished people can go up the mountain, they just don't get rescue services? I guess that's sensible if you are a die-hard capitalist libertarian, but then why do we need the government to do the rescuing? Let the richer hikers contract with Blackwater or something, and let everybody know the government won't be helping anybody.
And if some little 3-year old toddler wanders off, she'd better have the sense to have been born in the upper middle class or have lots of friends, because the sheriff can't afford to waste resources on some stupid little girl when his deputies are so busy forcibly evicting bankrupt citizens from their homes.
It sounds like the supercomputer generated an algorithm for the smartphone to run. I guess they can call that "leveraging the power of a supercomputer" but implying the phone app is doing supercomputing stretches things a bit far. I call misleading headline.
What I see at your link appears to show that historically, temperature increases weren't driven exclusively by CO2.
I don't see where it refutes the hypothesis that increasing atmospheric carbon causes temperatures to rise. In fact, FTA:
Any laymen will understand from [Al Gore's] statement that the ice-cores demonstrate a causal link, that higher amounts of CO2 give rise to higher temperatures. Of course, this could indeed be the case, and to some extent, it necessarily is .
The question before the house is whether increasing carbon increases temperatures, and the page you cite allows that possibility and admits "to some extent" that reality.
I don't think you have refuted the GW hypothesis, you've only shown that spikes in temperature have happened without a preceding spike in CO2.
> Ice cores clearly show a CO2 lag to temperature, so we've refuted that.
Wow. Great news. Please show your work so I can verify.
> stockbroker who admitted to stealing from
> clients to support a gambling habit
Doesn't every stockbroker gamble with their clients' money?
I love the idea of making them return it all. Beats taxing the rest of us to house them in Club Fed.
> it first must be stated as a falsifiable hypothesis
For GW, how about
"Significantly increasing the amount of carbon in the atmosphere causes global temperatures to rise"
After proving that, for AGW test
"Human activity has caused a significant net increase of carbon in the atmosphere".
For catastrophic AGW, pick your catastrophe:
"Increased global temperature causes polar ice to melt and sea levels to rise."
"Increased global temperature causes more intense weather events."
"Increased global temperature makes individual habitats unsuitable for their installed base"
> the AGW dodge is always about "the preponderance" of the evidence,
> neatly avoiding any refutation by pretending that science is some
> sort of democracy with majority rule.
Ah, the logical fallacy we call "the straw man". You are the one that equated preponderance of evidence with preponderance of opinion.
And I would think their refutation has merit; the preponderant evidence deserves more weight than anomalies.
If their data is inaccurate, submit the corrections. If their logic is flawed, woops, never mind, you've demonstrated that's not your specialty. But if you can prove any of the hypotheses above to be false, please do. Until then, you contribute nothing but FUD, of which we have a surplus already.
> Apparently their problems include the NOAA-16 satellite too
I hope WISE scientists aren't up nights worrying about every sensor of everybody else's satellites.
Nor do hardware glitches support the allegation that climatology is a fraudulent global conspiracy. Such FUD works great in politics, but to disprove AGW, scientists need reproducible counter-evidence. Press releases about anomalous sensor readings shouldn't influence otherwise tech-savvy people like you.
> we need to get humanity established elsewhere
Why "need"? In what way would the extinction of homo sapiens sapiens hurt the universe? Or the Earth? Or dead humans?
If mankind were gone, who but our surviving pets would miss us?
> somehow even spiritual
I guess I can kind of imagine what you mean, but I can't relate. I've killed animals before and likely will again, but the feelings I get are a momentary thrill of success if it was a hunt, sorrow for the loss and remorse for what I've done, and a satiated belly if I eat it.
Historically, people deposited their money at a "bank" so that the bank would keep it secure for them, allowing them to be ignorant of security best practices and specialize in something productive.
Today, banks have somehow absolved themselves of responsibility for security, and have convinced us all to blame the customer for lapses in security, so much that we even call it by the oxymoron "identity theft" without feeling any irony.
Banks should authenticate the transaction, and allow their customers to talk about their pets and mother's maiden name on Facebook without jeopardizing their account. But blaming the victim is easier, and we all seem to go along with it unquestioningly.
There's some context to think about. The US entered WWII as a direct result of American soil being attacked. It was pretty clear that fighting back was a matter of national security. In that context it would be easy to make the case that a leaker of battlefield secrets was treasonous.
Since then we've only waged elective wars, generally for purposes that leave many of us scratching our heads in confusion. Who knows what the hell we invaded Iraq for. Our strategy there and in Afghanistan seems to be to drive around in Hummers until somebody shoots us, then chase 'em down and shoot 'em back. How that benefits our national security is a mystery to me. Maybe some of these leaked documents can clarify it.
Julian Assange also admits someday he's probably going to have "blood on his hands." He has put himself in a tough situation. But I'm betting the increased daylight will do more good than bad.
> nothing beats having the skills to do what you are doing
Except perhaps doing new things, learning new skills, and taking whatever measures one deems prudent for comfort and safety while adventuring.
> As for Libertarianism, do you have a better suggestion?
Gladiator fights. I'll give three:one odds on the teabagger in the SUV over the treehugger with the polar bear.
Is it shark-mountable?
> a severe shortage of ... [sufficiently bright people]...
> with the skills and knowledge necessary to do battle
How many do we need? I submit that the number of brilliant hackers we need is quite small; if any shortage exists, it will be in the botnet, not the conference room.
> Who would you expect to show up at a Las Vegas venue called the "Super-Villain Expo," Lex Luthor, or wannabes in purple-spandex cosplay?
Great point - mod parent up.
To answer your question, I think Lex Luthor would show up and sell purple spandex cosplay to wannabes.
> the bank isn't in a position to oversee any of this transaction.
Huh? The bank is the one holding the money.
> How do you secure [a transaction] while actually letting Trent buy his gas?
How do you secure a building while actually letting authorized personnel pass through?
Your question is interesting, but it's the bank's job to figure out. Or it would be if they were in the safeguarding-money business.
Think about your bank's "security" for a moment. "Authentication" consists of providing publicly available information like your zip code, or SSN, or mother's maiden name. When they really try hard you have to authenticate yourself with a four digit numeric PIN. Bank transaction security hasn't evolved one bit (even in the crypto sense) since the 1970's. If anything it's gotten more lax.
But to answer your question, one pretty good solution currently available is RSA dongles.
Interesting that this "insight from the banking industry" doesn't seem to indicate the banks have any responsibility for the problem.
There once was a time that people took their money to the bank for safekeeping. I think banks have partly weaseled themselves out of the security side of the business, and what used to be called "bank robbery" they now call "identity theft." Which works ok for the bank, seeing how it's the customer who lost the money and it must have been the customer's fault, or the gas station's, or the POS equipment vendor's.
The bank, which should act like a watchdog, portrays itself as something of an innocent bystander.
> Don't steal the fucking music in the first place
Interesting point. But good luck convincing the RIAA - I doubt they'll ever stop stealing and fucking musicians.