In this on topic post (I'm still editing, but rushed to publish) I'm calling ExxonMobil devotees of Hecate, the queen of ghosts: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/06/necromancers.h tml. Will google be sent a take down notice? Let's wait and see.
In fact, having witnessed the breathless chops licking surounding the Petroleum Council report http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/02/trimming.html, I can say for sure that this was parody. No one would have taken this for the real thing if they were not completely stupified by anticipation. That report is going to say that we are going to boost our oil use by 30% by 2030. Amazing hornswagle, but there are many many people wishing to be duped by it. -- Break free of fossil fuels: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-users -selling-solar.html
The Darfur conflict is largely fueled by desertification brought on partly by climate change. Here are some 2005 estimates: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A124 85-2005Apr23.html. Things have not gotten any better since then, but the deaths
have become harder to count.
The most beautiful thing about this kind of acknowledgement is that no one pays for the illegal activity. The connections between the CIA and the mob
which likely protected the mob can be revealed without jailing the case officers involved. Presidents who authorized this kind of thing are beyond just
out of office. As criminal activities go, these things are an incredible success even when they didn't accomplished their criminal objectives. To me, this is most unabashed insult to the American people that I can think of.
I'll take a crack at that. There is a story in the Bible, Matthew 20:1--16, about laborers in a vineyard. This story turns on its head the usual
idea about benefits tracking the level of effort. Yet, within God's kingdom, where a small act of kindness can have a stunning effect, this story
teaches a deep truth. Is that a truth that was non-obvious? Yes and no. Taoist texts speak of the power of doing less and predate the story.
So, if you were to try to patent this there might be some issues with prior art. But, it does do away with the notion that proportionality is
useful when dealing with the infinite, something that really only Cantor eventually grasped when it came to numbers. He found out that you need new
classes. Yet, I find that those who come late to faith do not end up with less of it.
This may not be the kind of truth you are looking for. It says basically that things don't work the way you expect. Some people have a similar difficulty with quantum mechanics. But, it is something that is pretty suprising that also appears to be true.
I think it is probably OK for a monarchy to define what science is. In the end, a monarchy must be arbitrary.
But, in the US, it is probably better to let local schoolboards squabble about this.
Science does seek natural explanations so that the supernatural aspects of intelligent design do not fit within science. Science will
ultimately fail if natural explanations won't work. This would be an interesting result. It does seem quite unlikely that
demostrating that science has failed would occur in a high school classroom though. So, sticking to science in science class is
probably the best way to avoid wasting the student's time and perhaps preparing those who could, at some time in the future, show
that natural explanations of natural phenomena are inadequate. If a particular schoolboard sees things differently, well their students
can simply be left out of the college admissions process.
In the end, I think it is OK to preclude certain arguments being reasonable just because they don't fit the current framework. Arguments
in support of the idea that the Earth is flat don't fit and have a very hard time being reasonable. Most arguments for intelligent design sound
a lot like flat Earth arguments but you may find some that are beguiling, I don't know. --
No worries when you rent solar power: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-users -selling-solar.html
Your point 1) I think looking into the capabilities of other countries is a normal intelligence function rather than industrial espionage. If the US were doing this
and then providing trade secrets to say, Ford, then it would be different, but giving policy makers a heads up is not the same.
And 2) I agree that for non-multinational companies, it is likely in their interest to let the government know when they think they are being spied on,
but I don't see the need to train them on this when they can get it figured out themselves.
Industrial subsidies can occur when it is in the national interest to ensure the establishment of a new industry or to protect a vital industry, as in the case of your examples, or they can happen when campaign cotributions influence policy as occurs with some older established industried. When it is in
the nation's interest to completely change the market as appears to be the case in the energy market, subsidies could be a useful initial tool though I tend to think that rationing carbon would do a better job than choosing which alternative should replace it.
The activites of foriegn security services in the US is of interest, but when they are directed against private companies that should be
including the cost of protecting their trade secrets into their business model, why would we use counter intelligence assests to help them?
Consider clueful company A and clueless company B. A checks resumes, controls sensitive information and keeps an eye on the competition. B shares
information with new hires without checking their background, doesn't know where it is in the market, and doesn't pay attention to when someone is being inapropriately prying. Is it not a market distortion to try to subsidies company B with public money for expenses that company A is already covering
itself?
It is good corporate citizenship for a non-multinational to inform security services when it suspects spying is being attempted, but it does not make
a lot of sense to spend public money teaching it what it can learn on its own dime. Reports of attempted spying should be addressed with public resources since it can impinge on our cooperation with foreign intelligents services in more weighty matters. But, going beyond that does not make a lot of sense. When the foreign intelligents services manage to help out their own companies with spying, they actually weaken their domestic industry since they reduce incentives to maintain domestic intellectual capabilities. If we are always the source of innovation, then it hardly matters if drips and drops of that innovation are stolen, we will always be in the lead.
-- Get smart about solar power: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-users -selling-solar.html
The basic reason for classifying a subject is to protect sources and methods. Generally, research is going to fall under the methods portion. There is
a pretty clear national security interest in not sharing bomb designs or signal intellegence methods for example. Our security services also extend their interest to cover industrial espionage to help our companies protect trade secrets. This conflates a national security interest with what is more a
regular law enforcement activity, e.g. against fradulantly obtaining confidential information, and it is not clear that counter intelligents resources or methods should be expended in this way. I don't see why the FISA court should grant powers of domestic surveillance to keep Monanto
from losing a patent. They are multi-national in any case and ought to protect their trade secrets in the usual manner through civil enforcement of
non-disclosure agreements and such. That foriegn security agencies participate in industrial spying does not seem to me to justify our spending public funds on counter intelligents in these cases.
There is a clear national security interest in promoting the free exchange of ideas and a vibrant academic research enterprise and in so far as the FBI is
acting in a way that harms this interest, they are simply participating in the pattern of incompetence that seems to be pervasive in the DOJ. The whole idea of national defence requires that there be something worth defending. For the US, this is the Constitution and the freedoms it protects, so the
DOJ is placing itself in a position harming rather than helping the national defence.
For academic work, you do want credit for the work you do, but it is very much to your advantage that people want to use it. So, interest by people
in your field in the work you do is a sign of success. There are cases of industrial espionage where work that would lead to a patent on say, a drug,
is stolen so that another company can get the advantage. But, baring this, you'd like the other company to license you patent in most cases.
Even when other researchers use your ideas without giving credit, or worse, misunderstand your clear statements and say that your work supports their
work when it does not, they are relying on the credulity of students, who actually have to delve into a subject in detail and form their own opinions
on the relability of the offending author.
So, the situation is much different from that where a researcher in a classified area may become a target for espionage. The guidelines in this case
would seem to be more helpful in identifing those most likely to be successful in research: For example: so driven that they'll throw their own money
at a project (strange affluence), called on to travel to conferences in other countries (foreign travel), making connections with methods or techniques in other fields (broad range of interests),
and working round the clock to meet important deadlines (unusual work hours). --
Get solar power like knowledge (pay as you go): http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-users -selling-solar.html
Plants are more efficient than solar cells at being plants, but they are less efficient at making
energy for us: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/02/photosynthesis .html. This is why we can
just use the roof space we have to cover all of our energy use with 15% efficient solar panels, but trying to just cover liquid fuels use with plants runs into land use problems. But, you don't have
to get your electricity from the Sun alone. Wind could be used for this as well. --
Sprout silicon leaves: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-users -selling-solar.html
Slashdot Mirror
You can choose to read by blog or not. Looks like you choose not to in this case. But, many people have not choice about driving, this is why the phrase "addicted to oil" is used. There are many ways beyond the link I gave above that they behave like pushers. This example might interest you: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_street car_conspiracy.s -selling-solar.html
--
A Natural Electric High: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
Perhaps the ISP does not want to be subjected to this kind of analysis: http://www.chillingeffects.org/protest/notice.cgi? NoticeID=500?s -selling-solar.html
--
Convenient Solar Power: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
Europe?
In this on topic post (I'm still editing, but rushed to publish) I'm calling ExxonMobil devotees of Hecate, the queen of ghosts: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/06/necromancers.h tml. Will google be sent a take down notice? Let's wait and see.
You'd be right if ExxonMobil didn't act like a pusher http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/your-opinion-c ould-be-paid-for-by.html. But, by doing more, much much more, to try to be sure we buy more and more oil, they take on responsibility as well.s -selling-solar.html
--
Back to energy basics: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
In Corporate America the corporations say they benefit you!
;-)
Which side do I put the sarcasm? Aside or beside
How about Vivoleum(TM)?
--
Turning sunlight(TM) into a product: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
Hum... You Honor, how can you charge me with killing all those people? They were going to die anyway. Everyone does you know.
But seriously, read the article and see if malnutrition is not mentioned.
Are you thinking of the Gaia hypothesis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_hypothesis as your control mechanism?
In fact, having witnessed the breathless chops licking surounding the Petroleum Council report http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/02/trimming.html, I can say for sure that this was parody. No one would have taken this for the real thing if they were not completely stupified by anticipation. That report is going to say that we are going to boost our oil use by 30% by 2030. Amazing hornswagle, but there are many many people wishing to be duped by it.s -selling-solar.html
--
Break free of fossil fuels: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
But the poor things are only trying to do right by their shareholders. Shouldn't their high moral purpose trump mere individual rights?
The Darfur conflict is largely fueled by desertification brought on partly by climate change. Here are some 2005 estimates: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A124 85-2005Apr23.html. Things have not gotten any better since then, but the deaths
have become harder to count.
s -selling-solar.html
Their are deaths that can be even more directly tied to warming: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/04/doom.html as well. You should look into things a little more closely I think.
--
Get affordable solar power: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
I think you are right, but when I looked in google cache it was already gone.
Remember corporations have human rights too. ExxonMobile has an inherent free speech right to distort debate http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/your-opinion-c ould-be-paid-for-by.html and threaten others with law suits to intimidate them.
s -selling-solar.html
It is their right to have no sense of humor, especially if the joke is at their expense. Please be more sympathetic.
--
Det solar power are save money too: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
Now I thought this had potential as a nutritional supplement. Buried just like the ceramic engine....s -selling-solar.html
--
Rent solar power at 2005 electric rates: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
The most beautiful thing about this kind of acknowledgement is that no one pays for the illegal activity. The connections between the CIA and the mob which likely protected the mob can be revealed without jailing the case officers involved. Presidents who authorized this kind of thing are beyond just out of office. As criminal activities go, these things are an incredible success even when they didn't accomplished their criminal objectives. To me, this is most unabashed insult to the American people that I can think of.
I'll take a crack at that. There is a story in the Bible, Matthew 20:1--16, about laborers in a vineyard. This story turns on its head the usual idea about benefits tracking the level of effort. Yet, within God's kingdom, where a small act of kindness can have a stunning effect, this story teaches a deep truth. Is that a truth that was non-obvious? Yes and no. Taoist texts speak of the power of doing less and predate the story. So, if you were to try to patent this there might be some issues with prior art. But, it does do away with the notion that proportionality is useful when dealing with the infinite, something that really only Cantor eventually grasped when it came to numbers. He found out that you need new classes. Yet, I find that those who come late to faith do not end up with less of it.
This may not be the kind of truth you are looking for. It says basically that things don't work the way you expect. Some people have a similar difficulty with quantum mechanics. But, it is something that is pretty suprising that also appears to be true.
I think it is probably OK for a monarchy to define what science is. In the end, a monarchy must be arbitrary.
s -selling-solar.html
But, in the US, it is probably better to let local schoolboards squabble about this.
Science does seek natural explanations so that the supernatural aspects of intelligent design do not fit within science. Science will ultimately fail if natural explanations won't work. This would be an interesting result. It does seem quite unlikely that demostrating that science has failed would occur in a high school classroom though. So, sticking to science in science class is probably the best way to avoid wasting the student's time and perhaps preparing those who could, at some time in the future, show that natural explanations of natural phenomena are inadequate. If a particular schoolboard sees things differently, well their students can simply be left out of the college admissions process.
In the end, I think it is OK to preclude certain arguments being reasonable just because they don't fit the current framework. Arguments in support of the idea that the Earth is flat don't fit and have a very hard time being reasonable. Most arguments for intelligent design sound a lot like flat Earth arguments but you may find some that are beguiling, I don't know.
--
No worries when you rent solar power: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
Your point 1) I think looking into the capabilities of other countries is a normal intelligence function rather than industrial espionage. If the US were doing this and then providing trade secrets to say, Ford, then it would be different, but giving policy makers a heads up is not the same.
And 2) I agree that for non-multinational companies, it is likely in their interest to let the government know when they think they are being spied on, but I don't see the need to train them on this when they can get it figured out themselves.
Industrial subsidies can occur when it is in the national interest to ensure the establishment of a new industry or to protect a vital industry, as in the case of your examples, or they can happen when campaign cotributions influence policy as occurs with some older established industried. When it is in the nation's interest to completely change the market as appears to be the case in the energy market, subsidies could be a useful initial tool though I tend to think that rationing carbon would do a better job than choosing which alternative should replace it.
The activites of foriegn security services in the US is of interest, but when they are directed against private companies that should be including the cost of protecting their trade secrets into their business model, why would we use counter intelligence assests to help them?
s -selling-solar.html
Consider clueful company A and clueless company B. A checks resumes, controls sensitive information and keeps an eye on the competition. B shares information with new hires without checking their background, doesn't know where it is in the market, and doesn't pay attention to when someone is being inapropriately prying. Is it not a market distortion to try to subsidies company B with public money for expenses that company A is already covering itself?
It is good corporate citizenship for a non-multinational to inform security services when it suspects spying is being attempted, but it does not make a lot of sense to spend public money teaching it what it can learn on its own dime. Reports of attempted spying should be addressed with public resources since it can impinge on our cooperation with foreign intelligents services in more weighty matters. But, going beyond that does not make a lot of sense. When the foreign intelligents services manage to help out their own companies with spying, they actually weaken their domestic industry since they reduce incentives to maintain domestic intellectual capabilities. If we are always the source of innovation, then it hardly matters if drips and drops of that innovation are stolen, we will always be in the lead.
--
Get smart about solar power: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
If there is no crime, then don't you get 100% false positives?s -selling-solar.html
--
Rent solar power with no installation cost: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
The basic reason for classifying a subject is to protect sources and methods. Generally, research is going to fall under the methods portion. There is a pretty clear national security interest in not sharing bomb designs or signal intellegence methods for example. Our security services also extend their interest to cover industrial espionage to help our companies protect trade secrets. This conflates a national security interest with what is more a regular law enforcement activity, e.g. against fradulantly obtaining confidential information, and it is not clear that counter intelligents resources or methods should be expended in this way. I don't see why the FISA court should grant powers of domestic surveillance to keep Monanto from losing a patent. They are multi-national in any case and ought to protect their trade secrets in the usual manner through civil enforcement of non-disclosure agreements and such. That foriegn security agencies participate in industrial spying does not seem to me to justify our spending public funds on counter intelligents in these cases.
There is a clear national security interest in promoting the free exchange of ideas and a vibrant academic research enterprise and in so far as the FBI is acting in a way that harms this interest, they are simply participating in the pattern of incompetence that seems to be pervasive in the DOJ. The whole idea of national defence requires that there be something worth defending. For the US, this is the Constitution and the freedoms it protects, so the DOJ is placing itself in a position harming rather than helping the national defence.
For academic work, you do want credit for the work you do, but it is very much to your advantage that people want to use it. So, interest by people in your field in the work you do is a sign of success. There are cases of industrial espionage where work that would lead to a patent on say, a drug, is stolen so that another company can get the advantage. But, baring this, you'd like the other company to license you patent in most cases.
s -selling-solar.html
Even when other researchers use your ideas without giving credit, or worse, misunderstand your clear statements and say that your work supports their work when it does not, they are relying on the credulity of students, who actually have to delve into a subject in detail and form their own opinions on the relability of the offending author.
So, the situation is much different from that where a researcher in a classified area may become a target for espionage. The guidelines in this case would seem to be more helpful in identifing those most likely to be successful in research: For example: so driven that they'll throw their own money at a project (strange affluence), called on to travel to conferences in other countries (foreign travel), making connections with methods or techniques in other fields (broad range of interests), and working round the clock to meet important deadlines (unusual work hours).
--
Get solar power like knowledge (pay as you go): http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
The people are coming, so doing something about feeding them just makes sense: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/05/scrooge.html.
Plants are more efficient than solar cells at being plants, but they are less efficient at making energy for us: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/02/photosynthesis .html. This is why we can
just use the roof space we have to cover all of our energy use with 15% efficient solar panels, but trying to just cover liquid fuels use with plants runs into land use problems. But, you don't have
to get your electricity from the Sun alone. Wind could be used for this as well. s -selling-solar.html
--
Sprout silicon leaves: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
There are already laws on the books in a number of states that can help to protect landowner's rights to solar energy access. In NYC, local zoning is controlling: http://www.dsireusa.org/library/includes/tabsrch.c fm?state=NY&type=Access&back=regtab&Sector=S&Curre ntPageID=7&EE=1&RE=1
Most solar access laws were passed after the oil shocks of the seventies.
s tory?id=47928
s -selling-solar.html
Senator Menendez of NJ has introduced federal legislation to ensure access rights: http://www.renewableenergyaccess.com/rea/partner/
--
Rent solar power with no installation cost: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user