Pretty much every single thing in your statement is wrong. First of all, the US isn't a country based off of Christian law. Second, of all obeying the law has nothing to do what greetings people use during holiday seasons. Third, I'm more than happy to say "Merry Christmas" to people who are Christian. Moreover, I explicitly said that *I don't care* if someone says Merry Christmas to me. The entire point was that experiences like the one I had make me understand why people would be directly uncomfortable with it.
One can easily find behavior by people upset and angry over either version of this. The problem there is people engaging in violence in general over minor things. If you think that violent behavior is relegated to almost any single position on some issue, then you are probably wrong.
Happy holidays is inclusive for everyone, and includes people who don't celebrate Christmas. Merry Christmas is fundamentally exclusionary. I'm Jewish, and I don't care much, but after living in Alabama for a while, I can see why people care. Let me tell a story that's relevant that occurred with a work colleague (who already knew I was Jewish based on earlier conversations) when I was in Alabama (this occurred about December 20th or so last year):
Colleague: So are you going anywhere for Christmas break?
Me: Well, for break, I'll be spending time with my family who is going to be in Puerto Rico, and my wife is going back to visit her family back North.
Colleague: So you won't be together for Christmas? That's sad!
Me: Well, the relevant winter holiday for Jews is Channukah, which isn't a big family holiday for us. The big family holidays are Passover and the Jewish New Year.
Colleague: Oh ok, have a Merry Christmas,
Me: You too, NAME.
It was like he could not get in his head that someone didn't celebrate Christmas. Given that, it isn't at all surprising that some people find the repeated "Merry Christmas" really uncomfortable.
This isn't about multiculturalism in general, many of us are perfectly happy trusting and working with people from other cultures. Blaming this on multiculturalism when what one is really talking about is dominant groups reacting to multiculturalism is akin to a domestic abuser who after punching their spouses says "see what you make me do."
Any serious payload will be too expensive to risk on the first launch of a new rocket. That's why test launches like this usually use just a large hunk of material.
Considering that the Trump administration has responded to exactly zero petitions (the Obama admin at least responded to petitions even if the responses were sometimes dismissive), and given everything else this administration has done, I'm not sure how likely it should be that the system will be back when they say it will.
SpaceX experimented with trying to do parachute landings with the Falcon 1 and Falcon 9. If that had worked, then solids would have worked fine from a throttling standpoint. Solids do have other issues with reuse, in particular that you have to essentially crack open the whole thing and almost rebuild it from scratch which is why the solids from the shuttle were by many estimates more expensive to reuse than to just throw away. But at the same time, note that Falcon 1 wasn't really reusable at all- to a large extent SpaceX's plan was to first do rockets and then do reusability.
Rounding error compared to what? We don't lose anything by reducing CO2 use. And the amount of CO2 produced by launches is not small. For example, the Falcon 9 uses around 25,000 gallons of kerosene per a launch, which is about the same CO2 output as a moderate sized US town. However, the total produced CO2 if you count that made in making a rocket is typically an order of magnitude or more higher. Moreover, if your concern is about other pollutants, then the Falcon 9 and other rockets that SpaceX uses are also particularly clean for those also. One of the reasons that SpaceX avoided using solid rocket boosters is because they are terrible from a pollution perspective. Solid rocket motors often use aluminium perchlorate which is bad for the ozone layer since burning it releases chlorine (and has an impact similar to CFCs https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/04/090414-rockets-ozone.html), as well as all sorts of other nasties which are produced since they are also burning PBAN or some other rubber-like substance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polybutadiene_acrylonitrile. Yes, as a fraction of total pollution these are small, but we do better by reducing pollution from all sources in general, and every little bit helps.
The good news is that it seemed like NASA would be one of the last groups to use reused rockets because of their deep-seated bureaucracy. That they've used both a reused first-stage and a partially reused Dragon shows how far this has really come. And this sort of thing adds up to massive savings for the taxpayer, as well as making satellite launches cheaper for everyone else. Moreover, easy back of the envelope calculations also show that reusing first stages takes drastically less energy than throwing them away and so less CO2 is produced. (When SpaceX switches to their next rocket type which they intend to use the Raptor rocket engine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raptor_(rocket_engine_family) which will use methane, which can be produced using the Sabatier process https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabatier_reaction, which will allow in the long-run actually carbon neutral rockets.
The bad news is that as far as it seems, this sort of thing hasn't stopped the Space Launch System from continued to being funded https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Launch_System. The SLS is essentially a massively expensive, very large rocket that can only be used once. It has cost billions of dollars and will cost billions more, and it isn't going to be ready for a very long time, and may end up launching only 2 or 3 times. In contrast, SpaceX continues to work on the BFR (Big Falco Rocket https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BFR_(rocket), yes, "Falcon" can also stand for something else), is costing far less to develop than the SLS, will likely have a higher payload to low-earth orbit, and will be fully reusable. What this should be is a wake-up call to stop funding the SLS which is primarily massive pork for a small number of big defense and old space companies rather than a serious development of a useful launch system.
If this really bothers you enough that you aren't going to give to charity, and are that annoyed at them, one easy solution is to simply give to charities in blue states or which help relatively blue constituents. Everybody Solar lets you donate to specific projects, and one can for example donate to their solar projects in say Oregon http://www.everybodysolar.org/.
Your choice of charities optimizes for charities which maximizes how much one personally feels emotionally good about it, rather than maximizing the amount of good done per a dollar. For those who want to maximize utility increased, here are some others to consider, based on the Givewell ratings which tries to maximize things like quality adjusted life years per a dollar donated https://www.givewell.org/charities/top-charities. Their most effective charities are the Against Malaria Foundation https://www.givewell.org/charities/amf and the Malaria Consortium https://www.givewell.org/charities/malaria-consortium, which are so effective in part because malaria is such a huge problem but treatment for it is very cheap. If one wants to help deal with global warming then Cool Earth is the most optimal https://www.coolearth.org/, with other good ones including Everybody Solar http://www.everybodysolar.org/ and the Solar Electric Light Fund https://self.org/.
Honestly, people like you frighten me. That you think that this is a reasonable or productive way to interact with other humans is insane. On the positive side, the fact that your comments have been modded up is an excellent way of reminding me not to feel positive when my actually productive comments are modded up, since it underscores how many people here have absolutely no understanding or appreciation for anything remotely resembling useful discussion.
If you think that how people engage in snark says something about their testosterone level, or for that matter, if you think that someone's testosterone level is something worth remarking on or insulting people about, it says more about you than anyone you are talking to.
I would argue with you and normally also try to explain why globalism is good, but today I won't. Considering that the Republican Senators just voted for a tax bill which will saddle the US with an extra trillion dollars in debt and due tremendous damage to our basic research and other aspects, it seems like they really are acting like the caricature of "globalist" that some have, being willing to damage the US for their corporate overlords. Meanwhile, the people like me who are in favor of globalism for sanity and economic reasons don't have anything to do with this sort of crap.
Because existing is nice. One likes being around. A lot of people who have thought carefully about this are concerned. Last I checked, most people like existing.
Scott Aaronson, a prominent quantum computing expert made comments about some very similar work that is relevant https://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=3512. The short summary is that we should expect people to continue to push up how many qubits can be practically simulatable. But that sort of improvement through clever tricks and the like doesn't really do much to address the more interesting issue of quantum supremacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_supremacy, whether there are problems that a quantum computer can solve that a classical computer practically cannot. Note that the "practically" in the previous sentence is really important. Everything a quantum computer can do a classical computer can do with exponential slow down; standard conjectures essentially amount to saying that a classical computer cannot do any better than that.
This is completely confused. Net neutrality helps make more competition on the other end, the websites and other similar organizations. The idea that a lack of government regulation will necessarily lead to fewer monopolies is also wrong in general; often government intervention is needed to prevent the rise of monopolies. That's the whole point of anti-trust regulations. The canonical example used by economists is the steel mill; making new steel mills takes a massive amount of investment so if there's a steel mill monopoly, it is extremely hard for it to be disrupted by any new entries. Conservatives a decade ago understood this fine, and supported net neutrality. So often the left demonstrates a poor understanding of economics, but on this case, the "conservative" answer is doing a pretty good job at demonstrating that sort of lack of understanding.
Net neutrality did win on the idea front already, as demonstrated by the massive number of FCC comments in favor of it, and demonstrated by the sort of shady tactics used by the anti-net neutrality groups like posting millions of fake comments. The ideas won. Unfortunately we have a government where what ideas have won doesn't actually matter, and that situation is far, far worse under the current administration than it was under any of the last four at least.
These are useful things, but there's something you can do which will also be helpful: Remember to vote in 2020 against the guy who appointed this, and before then help vote for pro-net neutrality candidates. In the very short-term you can donate to Doug Jones's campaign for senate https://dougjonesforsenate.com... .
Slashdot Mirror
Pretty much every single thing in your statement is wrong. First of all, the US isn't a country based off of Christian law. Second, of all obeying the law has nothing to do what greetings people use during holiday seasons. Third, I'm more than happy to say "Merry Christmas" to people who are Christian. Moreover, I explicitly said that *I don't care* if someone says Merry Christmas to me. The entire point was that experiences like the one I had make me understand why people would be directly uncomfortable with it.
One can easily find behavior by people upset and angry over either version of this. The problem there is people engaging in violence in general over minor things. If you think that violent behavior is relegated to almost any single position on some issue, then you are probably wrong.
Happy holidays is inclusive for everyone, and includes people who don't celebrate Christmas. Merry Christmas is fundamentally exclusionary. I'm Jewish, and I don't care much, but after living in Alabama for a while, I can see why people care. Let me tell a story that's relevant that occurred with a work colleague (who already knew I was Jewish based on earlier conversations) when I was in Alabama (this occurred about December 20th or so last year):
Colleague: So are you going anywhere for Christmas break? Me: Well, for break, I'll be spending time with my family who is going to be in Puerto Rico, and my wife is going back to visit her family back North. Colleague: So you won't be together for Christmas? That's sad! Me: Well, the relevant winter holiday for Jews is Channukah, which isn't a big family holiday for us. The big family holidays are Passover and the Jewish New Year. Colleague: Oh ok, have a Merry Christmas, Me: You too, NAME.
It was like he could not get in his head that someone didn't celebrate Christmas. Given that, it isn't at all surprising that some people find the repeated "Merry Christmas" really uncomfortable.
I don't know, it seems strange, especially when there's so much actual news related to SpaceX, such as the recent government audit which found some pretty serious problems with their manufacturing and test protocols ( See article here https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-12-22/top-u-s-space-contractors-cited-for-lapses-by-pentagon-watchdog, actual report https://media.defense.gov/2017/Dec/22/2001860659/-1/-1/1/DODIG-2018-045_REDACTED.PDF). On a more positive note, SpaceX's Falcon Heavy is still on schedule, and we've now seen pictures of the fully-assembled Falcon Heavy https://www.space.com/39164-elon-musk-unveils-falcon-heavy-rocket-photos.html. But apparently, out of all the important things happening, a satirical letter is what is apparently what gets posted.
This isn't about multiculturalism in general, many of us are perfectly happy trusting and working with people from other cultures. Blaming this on multiculturalism when what one is really talking about is dominant groups reacting to multiculturalism is akin to a domestic abuser who after punching their spouses says "see what you make me do."
Any serious payload will be too expensive to risk on the first launch of a new rocket. That's why test launches like this usually use just a large hunk of material.
Again, see 'dismissive" which was acknowledged in the very first comment. I'm not sure what additional point you are trying to make here.
Let's see. They responded to a pro-marijuana legalization petition http://blog.norml.org/2011/10/29/white-house-response-to-normls-we-the-people-marijuana-legalization-petition/, and to this one related to the Westboro Baptist Church https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/03/white-house-westboro-baptist-church_n_3540814.html. If you want to argue that their responses were generally dismissive or lacking content, then sure, but I already acknolwedged that in my initial post.
Considering that the Trump administration has responded to exactly zero petitions (the Obama admin at least responded to petitions even if the responses were sometimes dismissive), and given everything else this administration has done, I'm not sure how likely it should be that the system will be back when they say it will.
SpaceX experimented with trying to do parachute landings with the Falcon 1 and Falcon 9. If that had worked, then solids would have worked fine from a throttling standpoint. Solids do have other issues with reuse, in particular that you have to essentially crack open the whole thing and almost rebuild it from scratch which is why the solids from the shuttle were by many estimates more expensive to reuse than to just throw away. But at the same time, note that Falcon 1 wasn't really reusable at all- to a large extent SpaceX's plan was to first do rockets and then do reusability.
Missed a phrase on my part; sorry. As about how much a medium sized town produces in a 24 hour period.
Rounding error compared to what? We don't lose anything by reducing CO2 use. And the amount of CO2 produced by launches is not small. For example, the Falcon 9 uses around 25,000 gallons of kerosene per a launch, which is about the same CO2 output as a moderate sized US town. However, the total produced CO2 if you count that made in making a rocket is typically an order of magnitude or more higher. Moreover, if your concern is about other pollutants, then the Falcon 9 and other rockets that SpaceX uses are also particularly clean for those also. One of the reasons that SpaceX avoided using solid rocket boosters is because they are terrible from a pollution perspective. Solid rocket motors often use aluminium perchlorate which is bad for the ozone layer since burning it releases chlorine (and has an impact similar to CFCs https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/04/090414-rockets-ozone.html), as well as all sorts of other nasties which are produced since they are also burning PBAN or some other rubber-like substance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polybutadiene_acrylonitrile. Yes, as a fraction of total pollution these are small, but we do better by reducing pollution from all sources in general, and every little bit helps.
The good news is that it seemed like NASA would be one of the last groups to use reused rockets because of their deep-seated bureaucracy. That they've used both a reused first-stage and a partially reused Dragon shows how far this has really come. And this sort of thing adds up to massive savings for the taxpayer, as well as making satellite launches cheaper for everyone else. Moreover, easy back of the envelope calculations also show that reusing first stages takes drastically less energy than throwing them away and so less CO2 is produced. (When SpaceX switches to their next rocket type which they intend to use the Raptor rocket engine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raptor_(rocket_engine_family) which will use methane, which can be produced using the Sabatier process https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabatier_reaction, which will allow in the long-run actually carbon neutral rockets.
The bad news is that as far as it seems, this sort of thing hasn't stopped the Space Launch System from continued to being funded https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Launch_System. The SLS is essentially a massively expensive, very large rocket that can only be used once. It has cost billions of dollars and will cost billions more, and it isn't going to be ready for a very long time, and may end up launching only 2 or 3 times. In contrast, SpaceX continues to work on the BFR (Big Falco Rocket https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BFR_(rocket), yes, "Falcon" can also stand for something else), is costing far less to develop than the SLS, will likely have a higher payload to low-earth orbit, and will be fully reusable. What this should be is a wake-up call to stop funding the SLS which is primarily massive pork for a small number of big defense and old space companies rather than a serious development of a useful launch system.
Utah actually did something very similar and it found that it not only worked well it almost paid for itself https://www.npr.org/2015/12/10/459100751/utah-reduced-chronic-homelessness-by-91-percent-heres-how.
If this really bothers you enough that you aren't going to give to charity, and are that annoyed at them, one easy solution is to simply give to charities in blue states or which help relatively blue constituents. Everybody Solar lets you donate to specific projects, and one can for example donate to their solar projects in say Oregon http://www.everybodysolar.org/.
Your choice of charities optimizes for charities which maximizes how much one personally feels emotionally good about it, rather than maximizing the amount of good done per a dollar. For those who want to maximize utility increased, here are some others to consider, based on the Givewell ratings which tries to maximize things like quality adjusted life years per a dollar donated https://www.givewell.org/charities/top-charities. Their most effective charities are the Against Malaria Foundation https://www.givewell.org/charities/amf and the Malaria Consortium https://www.givewell.org/charities/malaria-consortium, which are so effective in part because malaria is such a huge problem but treatment for it is very cheap. If one wants to help deal with global warming then Cool Earth is the most optimal https://www.coolearth.org/, with other good ones including Everybody Solar http://www.everybodysolar.org/ and the Solar Electric Light Fund https://self.org/.
This wasn't a decision that the facts didn't agree with the employees, only that it didn't merit a class action lawsuit.
Honestly, people like you frighten me. That you think that this is a reasonable or productive way to interact with other humans is insane. On the positive side, the fact that your comments have been modded up is an excellent way of reminding me not to feel positive when my actually productive comments are modded up, since it underscores how many people here have absolutely no understanding or appreciation for anything remotely resembling useful discussion.
If you think that how people engage in snark says something about their testosterone level, or for that matter, if you think that someone's testosterone level is something worth remarking on or insulting people about, it says more about you than anyone you are talking to.
I would argue with you and normally also try to explain why globalism is good, but today I won't. Considering that the Republican Senators just voted for a tax bill which will saddle the US with an extra trillion dollars in debt and due tremendous damage to our basic research and other aspects, it seems like they really are acting like the caricature of "globalist" that some have, being willing to damage the US for their corporate overlords. Meanwhile, the people like me who are in favor of globalism for sanity and economic reasons don't have anything to do with this sort of crap.
Because existing is nice. One likes being around. A lot of people who have thought carefully about this are concerned. Last I checked, most people like existing.
Scott Aaronson, a prominent quantum computing expert made comments about some very similar work that is relevant https://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=3512. The short summary is that we should expect people to continue to push up how many qubits can be practically simulatable. But that sort of improvement through clever tricks and the like doesn't really do much to address the more interesting issue of quantum supremacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_supremacy, whether there are problems that a quantum computer can solve that a classical computer practically cannot. Note that the "practically" in the previous sentence is really important. Everything a quantum computer can do a classical computer can do with exponential slow down; standard conjectures essentially amount to saying that a classical computer cannot do any better than that.
This is completely confused. Net neutrality helps make more competition on the other end, the websites and other similar organizations. The idea that a lack of government regulation will necessarily lead to fewer monopolies is also wrong in general; often government intervention is needed to prevent the rise of monopolies. That's the whole point of anti-trust regulations. The canonical example used by economists is the steel mill; making new steel mills takes a massive amount of investment so if there's a steel mill monopoly, it is extremely hard for it to be disrupted by any new entries. Conservatives a decade ago understood this fine, and supported net neutrality. So often the left demonstrates a poor understanding of economics, but on this case, the "conservative" answer is doing a pretty good job at demonstrating that sort of lack of understanding.
Net neutrality did win on the idea front already, as demonstrated by the massive number of FCC comments in favor of it, and demonstrated by the sort of shady tactics used by the anti-net neutrality groups like posting millions of fake comments. The ideas won. Unfortunately we have a government where what ideas have won doesn't actually matter, and that situation is far, far worse under the current administration than it was under any of the last four at least.
These are useful things, but there's something you can do which will also be helpful: Remember to vote in 2020 against the guy who appointed this, and before then help vote for pro-net neutrality candidates. In the very short-term you can donate to Doug Jones's campaign for senate https://dougjonesforsenate.com... .