Slashdot Mirror


User: amilo100

amilo100's activity in the archive.

Stories
0
Comments
235
First seen
Last seen
Profile
(view on slashdot.org)

Comments · 235

  1. Re:Bah! on Whistleblower Claims IEA Is Downplaying Peak Oil · · Score: 1

    On the contrary, they are very feasible. We can convert entirely, yes entirely, to wind, water, and solar power, and we can do it in 20 years, and thereby head off further global warming. No need for coal or nuclear. But don't take my word for it. Read about it here [scientificamerican.com].

    Again, it is a pipe-dream. That is one article that tries to explain this pipe dream. I urge you to look at McKay’s “Global warming without the hot air”. The numbers (and cost) for renewable energy simply doesn’t add up. The only feasible method is hydropower (in certain areas). A nuclear power plant is 1.6GW. How much power does a solar plant generate? Or a wind turbine. (Even the largest solar farms doesn’t come close to one tenth of a nuclear power plant).

    Saving the environment is NOT diametrically opposite the economy, but you repeat that lie as if you halfway believe it.

    Yes it is. Heavy industry requires large amounts of cheap electricity. (A good example is aluminium smelters). Energy produced by expensive and unfeasible “renewable sources” are too expensive. The result is usually that heavy industry is exported to a country with a more sensible energy policy (e.g. China).

    The big lie is Obama (and other politicians’) “Creation of green jobs”. But they say that if you repeat a lie often enough it will be believed.

    Lots of green jobs setting up all those windmills and solar panels.

    This is the broken window fallacy. Money (and therefore jobs) is removed from productive areas of the economy to “create” the green jobs. The end result is a loss of jobs.

    And after, the economic good continues as manufacturing enjoys cheaper power, and it will eventually be cheaper.

    There is no evidence whatsoever that renewable energy will be cheaper. Wind turbines uses technology that is almost a century old, and improvements will be doubtful. Solar power is limited by the cost of land and the amount of energy that reaches the Earth. Even if solar magically reaches 50% efficiency at no cost, the area that would be required is about 6400000 square meters to be equivalent to a nuclear power plant. That is about 640 hectares under solar panels. Oh, and it only runs while the sun shines.

    If you want to use solar power or wind farms, why don’t you pay for it instead of forcing it on other people? Nothing is stopping you (and other people) from having a dual system (where you pay 10 times the amount for your electricity bill and we pay normal price). If solar and wind farms is so cost effective, **why isn’t there a single one being built without relying on government subsidies**?

    We have not even started talking about how the environmentalists destroy the environment with bans on elephant culling or trade in ivory. Then there is still the issue of the hypocrites trying to ban the hunting of Mink whales (by bribing 3rd world land-locked countries). Mink whales aren’t even close to endangered (there are 700,000+ of them).

    And then there is also the question of enviro-terrorists-hypocrites attacking nuclear power plants and disrupting industry.

  2. Re:If True, Fascinatingly Bizarre Logic on Whistleblower Claims IEA Is Downplaying Peak Oil · · Score: 1

    AFAIK Chevron-Texaco is also pretty good.

    There were two main reasons why we developed that particular piece of technology. The first was that both communists (USSR) and the liberals in the west hated us and wanted us destroyed. The second reason was that we have plenty of cheap low grade coal.

    (We rather did the research than attack Middle Eastern countries).

  3. Re:Bah! on Whistleblower Claims IEA Is Downplaying Peak Oil · · Score: 2, Interesting

    We have a radical fringe, just like the Dems and the Repubs.

    The radical fringe of the environmentalists composes 80% of the environmentalists. I deeply care for the environment, but it seems like no-one sensible is allowed to call themselves an environmentalist.

    More of us are interested in coal being a problem than nuclear plants.

    Now you are. The hot topic/semi-religion now in environmentalism is “global warming”. 20 years ago it was nuclear power. The arguments against nuclear power were mostly scare tactics and fallacies of reasoning. The environmental movement (to me at least) lost all credibility after that.

    At least the founder of Greenpeace (Patric Moore - http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/14/AR2006041401209.html ) had the intellectual honesty to admit that he and the organisation was completely wrong about nuclear power.

    The problem with nuclear plants are that they don't behave well, and leave nasty poo that doesn't become safe for about 300,000 years. Look it up.

    Firstly, coal powerplants spew nasty radioactive waste directly into the atmosphere (on the same order of magnitude as nuclear power plants). Oh, and they spew a lot of other nasty shit in the atmosphere too. This causes a lot of unseen health problems (cancer, lung disease). Millions of people die each year because of the effects of coal power stations (and more than 5000 in coal mining accidents alone).

    Secondly, you may never have heard of reprocessing of nuclear fuel or fast breeding reactors. With any of these steps the amount of nuclear waste left is minute, and its half-life is about two centuries. But no, they would rather prefer acid rain and global warming.

    Unfortunately it seems as if environmentalists want to destroy the economy in addition to the environment with their coal power plants and unfeasible and extremely expensive “renewable energy” pipedreams. Neither wind nor solar are feasible. Their bio-fuel (ethanol from maize or sugercane) pipe dream destroys the environment at such a rate. But they would rather we chop down rainforest to plant sugarcane than to use oil.

    That said, you can scrub anything. It depends on how much it costs as to whether it's practical. Coal burning plants are difficult to scrub.

    Carbon-Dioxide recapturing in coal power stations is also something of a pipe dream. I suspect that they are only doing it to try and get money from the government.

    Oh, yeah. Why do they hate GM foods? Would they rather see people starve? Nobody forces them to eat GM foods. GM maize may just lessen the wholescale environmental destruction that their bio-fuel pipe dreams create.

    --- Sorry for the harsh tone, but environmentalists is really one group that (for me at least) is one of the most harmful hate groups of modern society.

  4. Re:Bah! on Whistleblower Claims IEA Is Downplaying Peak Oil · · Score: 1

    The problem is that burning it blows carbon-oxygen atoms out tailpipes, where they pollute, and ultimately cause atmospheric damage.

    A much bigger cause of Carbon Dioxide, Sulphur Dioxide, particulate pollution and other nasties is coal burning in power generation.

    But that sure didn't bother environmentalists when they ensured that no-one built nuclear power plants. Now they are moaning about global warming caused by the carbon dioxide in their coal power plants. And their preferred solution (wind generation and solar panels) are a pipe dream (that is a consequence of those hippies smoking too much pot).

    Environmentalists is the reason why we can't have nice things.

  5. Re:What's in it? on Landmark Health Insurance Bill Passes House · · Score: 1

    In my country, pre-existing conditions just mean that you can't claim anything for 12 months after joining.

    So, I guess, welcome to the 20th century!

    This is really stupid. This means that you can sign up for a cheap health-care plan, and as soon as you have a chronic illness, you sign up for an expensive one. Isn't this completely stupid? This means that those who joined the plan while they are still healthy have to pay for those who joined because they are sick.

  6. Re:So... when? on Babies Begin Learning Language In the Womb · · Score: 1

    I'm anti abortionist, yet even I know that abortionists actually reason that it is before the brain develops that should be allowed. If you want to be treated fairly, treat people fairly. Most people would recognise that without a brain the fetus is not viable.

    Viability is actually defined as the capability of a baby to live outside its mother. It has nothing to do with brain development. Abortion is usually legal until 22-26 weeks (there have been premies born before 22 weeks who survived, but the survival rate is low).

    The biggest killer of babies born prematurely (and the reason they struggle to survive at 20 weeks) is the development of their lungs (they thus have severe difficulty to breathe).

  7. Re:Cool tech. on A High-Res 3D Video of the Embryonic Heartbeat · · Score: 5, Insightful

    A fetus is nothing special. Because a human is nothing special. It is very arrogant to think that we're oh-so-special. We're not. Life in itself is nothing special.

    I see human life as special. This may be because I am human and therefore extremely subjective.

    I am sure that when an alien race lands on earth they will be a lot more objective than us.

  8. Re:Cool tech. on A High-Res 3D Video of the Embryonic Heartbeat · · Score: 3, Informative

    This paper:

    http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/252560-overview

    states: Fetal indications for abortion

    ... The most common fetal anomalies encountered in abortion counseling include most **fetal cardiac anomalies**; trisomy 21; open and closed neural tube defects; limb, face, or cleft abnormalities; esophageal

  9. Re:Cool tech. on A High-Res 3D Video of the Embryonic Heartbeat · · Score: 1, Flamebait

    It is funny that your post is modded as insightful. I think you and I both know what this technology will be used for.

    This is just a screening process. So foetuses that will have any sign of cardiovascular abnormalities will be aborted. It will become just another in a round of tests that determine if a foetus will be aborted or get to live.

    Yet somehow you pre-emptively blame people who are opposed to abortion (because you imagine that it is they who will use this technology).

  10. Re:marketshare on Now Linux Can Get Viruses, Via Wine · · Score: 1

    You would think there would be at least one well know case in the wild by now of a linux virus spreading to other linux machines in a sustained and ongoing manner.

    Have you ever thought about how viruses spread? A lot of Windows users get viruses or adware by downloading a program from a website (e.g. P2P programs, games, etc...). Most Linux users get their software via official repositories - which removes that method in which viruses spread. When last did you download a Cracked Copy of a Linux game of software package?

  11. Re:This is an outrage! on Yahoo Offered Lap Dances At Hack Event · · Score: 1

    I notice you didn't sufficiently motivate your government to stop the US government from invading Iraq, yet you talk as if you think you're not just as responsible as I am for what happened.

    I am an ethnic minority who can’t even stop the government from destroying my language and culture.

    I don't have a cartoon episode to reference to help illustrate my point though, so I suppose that might not be quite up to your standards.

    I made the point in a light-hearted fashion (although it is still a valid point IMHO).

    Let me rephrase my point – only in modern (industrial times) such a great amount of people died in wars. The reason for that is diverse – the population is higher, better technology exists and wars became more globalised (Before industrialization it was difficult to have “World Wars” since a large section of the world wasn’t even discovered).

    In the middle Ages wars were limited to the armies that the ruling elite could raise – and therefore they weren’t as big and as vicious. This changed in a large part with Napoleon who raised extremely large armies by conscription.

    In any case, the economy globalized to such an extent and with the introduction with nuclear warfare, wars between major powers became extremely rare. In the past half century major powers just fought proxy wars against each other.

    But that doesn’t mean that we have become more moral – I personally think that we have become less moral. We have fewer wars because of economic and other factors – not because of a change of heart.



    About the cartoon episode – I think that it proves a point. The USA lacks a collective guilt over its foreign policy. I am not saying this is a bad thing. Citizens of other countries and groups do however have a collective guilt (or expected to have) over things that they had no direct influence in (e.g. Germany in WW2). This is clearly not a good thing.

  12. Re:This is an outrage! on Yahoo Offered Lap Dances At Hack Event · · Score: 1

    A lot of us were opposed to the Iraq war.

    That is what I like about the USA. They can go to war and still not be responsible for it. It is exactly like this South Park: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I'm_a_Little_Bit_Country

    No. 620,000 [answers.com] people died in the american civil war, over 60 million people [wikipedia.org] died in world war 2.

    I am talking about a long long time ago.

    I suppose you might count WWII as a modern war, which would be fair. But the people who believe the world is in moral decline say it started around the '60s, not before WWII.

    You are also conflating morality with the number of people that dies in wars. There are a lot of other reasons why less people dies in war (nuclear weapons, a globalised economy, etc). That doesn’t mean that the world is more moral.

  13. Re:This is an outrage! on Yahoo Offered Lap Dances At Hack Event · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I don't fully understand their mindset, people who honestly believe the world is becoming more immoral. They seem to ignore the fact that we're no longer burning women at the stake for being witches,

    No. But you do torture people in Guatanamo. You also make people write TPS reports in small cubicles.

    we no longer have slavery, we no longer go on crusades (er... as overtly anyway.)

    But you do kill people in Iraq. Wars in the past was fairly small scale compared to industrialized death and destruction.

  14. Re:Trollin'. on NCSU's Fingernail-Size Chip Can Hold 1TB · · Score: 1

    In my country both systems are used (one for English and one for my first language). They realized that this was still not confusing enough so they temporarily switched to the other and then switched back.

    You can luckily usually guess which number it is - if it deals with government corruption or arms deals it is usually the larger one.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_and_short_scales#South_African_usage

  15. Re:A little early on The Kindle Killer Arrives · · Score: 1

    There are always more of them then bullets on hand.

    He is not the only one who forgot a rule.

  16. Re:My vote, my business on Legal War For WA State Sunshine Law · · Score: 1

    They know damn well mid-terms have much lower turn-out. The lower the office elected the less people show up. The "vocal minority" responsible for the referendum will be disproportionately represented, and the silent majority who are OK with gay marriage but don't care enough to interrupt their day will not be represented at all, allowing an even SMALLER minority to be oppressed.

    Wow. So know you oppose elections because some people who you think will vote the same as you will not show up to vote? If people do not vote on an issue it is their choice.

    If the voting goes against their beliefs (and they didn't vote) it is their problem and they can correct it next time.

  17. Re:CO2 cutbacks cannot stop climate change on Maldives Government Holds Undersea Cabinet Meeting · · Score: 1

    All I could find out about Steve McIntyre was that he was a Canadian computer analyst [senate.gov] not a climatologists, meteorologist, or had another degree that qualified him to label scientists with the qualifications they are wrong.

    He is not a computer analyst – the article is wrong. He did a BSc in pure mathematics at the University of Toronto. After that he did a PPE at the University of Oxford on a Commonwealth Scholarship (those are fairly prestigious).

    What is impressive though is that his analysis caused the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) to adjust their temperature record (i.e. they made an error). Unfortunately the way that they calculate it is still not known. So there is no reproducibility of their research.

    The point that he makes (and that I agree with) is that a lot of climatologists are good at climatology but not good at the statistical side. Statistical rigor lack in that field (as it does many fields).

    What is dubious is that Steve McIntyre has greater qualifications over the climate than climatologists.

    He never claimed to be a climatologist. He simply analyses data in peer reviewed papers for statistical rigor.

    By the way, the head of the IPCC that accepted the Nobel Prize is a Railway Engineer without any qualification in either statistics or climatology. (This guy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rajendra_K._Pachauri )

  18. Re:CO2 cutbacks cannot stop climate change on Maldives Government Holds Undersea Cabinet Meeting · · Score: 1, Insightful

    This is really sad: Experts spend years analyzing the data, come to an extremely complicated conclusion based on mountains of evidence, and then someone who has not the slightest fucking clue about science or mathematics walks in and says "

    The problem is that mathematical rigor is absent from most environmental studies. This is kinda surprising. For a good overview see this site: http://www.climateaudit.org/.

    Quite a few highly regarded studies uses statistically dubious methods.

    While I think that AGW is true, a lot more research needs to be done in a proper fashion.

  19. Re:Is day trading a good thing? on Device Protects Day Traders From Emotional Trading · · Score: 1

    Not completely. A lot of people may want to cash in their stocks. Day traders provide liquidity.

    If a large organisation sells a significant stake in a company it is day traders who will gobble everything up (making it possible to sell in the first place).

  20. Re:This wont work... on Image Recognition Neural Networks, Open Sourced · · Score: 1

    2 cents:

    However, using a SVM on the raw-image data produces the same horrible results that I would expect here.

    SVMs would probably work a lot better. SVMs perform excellent in high dimensional datasets.

    Simple feed forward ANNs screws up – if you have a large amount of input values (e.g. treating the whole image as a vector) there will be a lot of weights on the input layer. So I really don’t know why you would use a normal ANN.

    SVMs will probably give decent results for linear kernels and quadratic kernels for images. You can get excellent results by using locality improved kernels (which are actually pretty simple).

    Convolution neural networks perform pretty well with images though.

  21. Re:Who says science is underfunded? on Huge ISS Science Report Released · · Score: 1

    The ISS was never about science.

  22. Re:Brother Lazer printer on Choosing a Personal Printer For the Long Haul · · Score: 1

    I actually came to this thread to bitch and moan about Lexmarks and is disappointed by the lack of it. Anyways, I bought an HP350 as a poverty stricken student and its cartridges refill perfectly (30 refills/cartridge).

  23. Re:US technology on $529M Gov't Loan To Develop $89,000 Hybrid Sports Car · · Score: 1

    Sorry, but this doesnâ(TM)t cut it. Some of the most important technology in a hybrid is components. The real innovation lies in the components â" such as batteries and power electronics. I doubt that one car design would create so much IP.

    It would have been cool if the DOE rather gave the half a billion to several USA start-ups working in those areas. A good example is Battery manufacture which has a shitload of challenges (and opportunities).

    The above looks like a revolving door scheme â" the company give money for an election campaign to the politicians and now the politicians give public money back. A company that gives $2.2 million dollars in political donations already have enough money.

  24. Re:Differences between versions on Wolfenstein Being Recalled In Germany · · Score: 1

    And the Yankee flag... How many wars have you started?


    Probably the most offensive flag in existence is the Union Jack. It represents quite a few years of oppression (the Nazi flag just 4 years).

  25. Re:Big News? on FDA OKs First Human Trial of Neural Stem Cell Therapy · · Score: 1

    If the drug shows success during trials they sometimes put the placebo group also on the drug.