Actually.. the longer it takes to develop the technology the cheaper the price/performance ratio and the less expenditure required. That's just how technology does it's thing. Getting stuff to orbit becomes ever cheaper and it becomes ever more efficient space propulsion with higher specific impulse, means it'll eventually be affordable to go hunting artefacts of early space exploration.
Means eventually the Voyagers will be stumbled upon by the interstellar equivalent of a Tuk Tuk and sold on the black market in some Kupier belt slum.
I think that's mistakenly equating technological advance with advances in energy cost and supply. Barring energy advancements we simply haven't seen yet (cheap cold fusion, etc.) I'm not so confident about this prediction.
This basically assumes that energy availability will continue to increase, based on some unspecified technological advancements, when we seem to be reaching plateaus or declines. We're exhausting many of our supplies and have failed to develop the new technology... we could simply collapse or decline.
The people saying we should do nothing are doing so mostly out of an ideological mistrust of government doing anything, but they are going to be very regretful when they realize the markets failed to see and prepare for a future that experts and government DID predict, and could have prevented or at least vastly reduced the severity of.
As much as I'd love to agree with you, this just isn't true. We look back on the Savings & Loan crisis and see how government could have prevented it. We look back on the great depression and see what the government could have done better. We look at the latest financial crash and know it could have been prevented.
Free Marketists, however, blame all of the above on government action. They blame FDR for the Great Depression. While they won't join us in our fight to end oil subsidies today, conservatives in 50 years will almost certainly be saying that government caused an oil crisis. They will claim that a truly free energy market would have corrected itself sooner.
No. If you take a test and score too low, you get rejected, so we've already established that you're allowed to discriminate by IQ / intelligence. If you're saying that it's discriminatory to disqualify people who score too high, then you can't justify disqualifying people who score too low, either.
Not necessarily. Or really at all.
You can discriminate for hiring on any factor that isn't protected. Race, gender, religion, etc. are protected by federal and usually state law. The protected factors can also be discriminated against when it's a bona fide job requirement: a casting director who needs a white male actor can't be sued for turning down a black applicant for the same acting position.
you have the wrong firmware installed, I suggest you upgraded it to submissive woman 36.D. Then you will have response like "only a BJ, you are a kind master" or "you are so generous master, I will do the laundry after I swallow".
Not the wrong firmware, just insufficient user privileges.
That's your own fault. If you can't root it right yourself, perhaps you should hire an expert to do it for you?
Although the ocean does provide a convenient and unlimited source of cooling water
Another convenient fact about the ocean: no one lives there. A nuclear disaster will hurt fewer people, then.
Another inconvenient fact about the reactor on the ocean: San Onofre is about halfway between San Diego and Los Angeles (ok, not that far from the north county SD area, but still). You know how much international shipping goes through LA? Tourism to Southern California's beaches? I'll give you a hint: a whole lot of people and a whole lot of money would be at risk.
We're talking about several very large metropolitan areas within an ~50 mile radius, one major military base, and a huge chunk of California's economy. No insurer in the world will touch those risks.
One of the mantras of law enforcement is "sometimes you have to break the law to enforce the law." An example is speeding to catch drivers evading arrest.
That's just silly. Speed laws frequently have exceptions built in for law enforcement and emergency services. Ambulances, for example, may be allowed to exceed the speed limit by 10 mph when circumstances warrant provided they have lights and sirens on and follow certain other requirements. There's no law-breaking involved because the law specifically allows for that.
I imagine similar exceptions have long been carved out for police attempting to enforce laws, catch speeders, etc.
What the world needs is a way for bright kids to drop out of the overpriced educational treadmill without being suspected of having a chip on their shoulder. Or educated voters who give a damn, but the second item seems out of reach.
I think we can all agree there. We'll eventually see a correction in the education market... but it will have to be a systemic change. The problem isn't bright kids, though--they can do well with or without an education. Average kids are the problem. For people of average intelligence and no exceptional ability, missing that little piece of sheepskin really will limit their futures. As long as employers require degrees for many jobs, employees will have to get those degrees.
(Is it just myth that back when education was rare, presidents spoke intelligently, and now that education is universal, presidents speak only in blithering platitudes?)
I think it's really more about mass media and the changing style of news reporting. Yes, in Lincoln's days debates would go on for hours and politicians were expected to delve deeply into issues, know their shit, and deliver great oratory. These days, very few people watch full debates, debates are moderated to limit answers to ~1 minute, and the vast majority of people will only be exposed to 10-second sound bites from the debates. The incentive is for politicians to produce sound bites... so they do.
Doing research and publishing articles *is* a professor's job. There are professors who only do research and do not teach, but there are no professors who only teach. In fact, a number of professors work at research institutions which do not even offer classes. While teaching is probably the most publicly visible aspect of a university, the real mission of the university system is to create and propagate knowledge in general.
Community colleges... Plenty of universities have part timers who just teach a class or two and may have no real research requirements. The UC system had a proposal recently that would have allowed three tracks: teaching only, research only, and hybrid. I believe that failed, but I imagine it's been implemented somewhere.
Plus, there's Hogwarts. And I'm not sure the professors at Hogwarts actually teach, seeing as how Harry only knows a handful of spells after how many years?
I see this all the time. The bright kids today are going into law or the financial industry, because that's where all the money is. Why bother working your ass off in school studying hard subjects that involve math, when you can party your way through school, get a law degree or something in financial mumbo-jumbo, and make 3 times as much working for Merril Lynch? Not to mention not worrying about having your job shipped to India or China.
Overall I agree that our system is FUBAR and producing an oversupply of lawyers, bankers, etc., but... law school isn't easy. At least not the good ones.
From my experience, all I can say is that the top earners in law, finance, and similar fields are generally extremely intelligent people who also had to work their asses off to get to where they are. It's not easy... it's just a hell of a lot more remunerative than, say, civil engineering.
Also, lawyers are suffering from pretty high unemployment rates right now, and that's expected to continue for a long time to come. The economy is correcting (slightly), just not as much as it should.
It's funny because what is happening in Japan is exactly why Nuclear Power is SAFE!
An earthquake 7 times more powerful than the biggest it was built for hit, and all that happened to the reactors that didn't shut down cleanly was a small amount of radioactive noble gases, which decay within minutes. Even if the cores DO melt, they're safely contained in... wait for it... containment chambers!
Errm.. part of the concern is that the containment domes were damaged by the explosions. The fact that they are leaking means containment isn't working. It's still better than nothing, but the stuff's NOT contained.
Your post has several other serious flaws. First, the radiation released appears to be far more than "radioactive noble gases". Second, the issue wasn't whether the cores shutdown... the other reactors (Daichi #4, 5, and 6) had already been deactivated for maintenance. They were offline when the quake hit. The problem is that each reactor also houses a pool with spent fuel rods in it. These fuel rods have to cooled and are encased in zirconium... which oxidizes and breaks down when exposed to the atmosphere. This seems to have caused the H2 buildup and explosion. Problem? These aren't housed in the primary containment dome, and the explosion blew holes in the rest. Third, if these keep going, it'll be worse than a partial meltdown inside a contained reactor because they are NOT contained. Fourth, reactors 5 & 6 at Daichi could face the same fate if they don't find a way to get cooling in there, and this may be impossible due to radiation coming out of #4.
People don't realize the amount of engineering that goes into nuclear to make it safe.
I'm a pretty big proponent of nuclear power, but that's bull and you know it. An incredible amount of engineering goes into making nuclear safer than it used to be. It is not, by any definition, safe. I'm sure coal has killed more people, but let's not go misleading people here. Even with modern designs and safeguards, well trained operators, and routine inspections, nuclear accidents can and do happen.
Disclaimer: IANANP. Also, information about what's going on inside some of those reactors isn't 100% at this point. Last I checked, they couldn't even get cameras into them, so not even the IAEA or Japan know exactly what is going on or what the water levels are in the spent fuel pools.
You've got us all talking about your game on a very popular forum, and you haven't even mentioned what the name of it is. I was interested, and might've bought it to try it out and give you some feedback.
TV Shows in HD should cost 99 cents to own, 50 cents to stream...
No. The artificial distinction between "streaming" and "downloading" is another driver of piracy. Let me download the damn file and not have to deal with bandwidth issues and sucky Flash players. I'm probably only going to watch it once anyway.
I should be able to tell my computer, "Here's $5/month. Each night around 4am -- when I'm asleep and thus using no bandwidth -- download the latest Daily Show and have it waiting for me over breakfast." I could just about do this now for free with torrents and RSS.
O you could do it for free with Sick Beard right now.
Well, sure. Obviously UCSF (one of the best medical schools in the world) has a higher quality program. But they do have a LVN program, too.
Doing some digging around, their fees (http://registrar.ucsf.edu/registration/fees/nursing) are comparable with private schools in the area, and there's (less good) public schools that are much cheaper.
I couldn't even find an LVN program at UCSF. If you say they have one, I'll believe you, but all the programs I see there are for people who already have some training.
For LVN or CNA, it seems the most economical route, by far, would be to go to a community college. Those programs have the same low entry requirements as the for-profits, and CA community colleges charge a whopping $26/unit/semester. Since LVN at CCSF is an 18-month program, I'll just go ahead and call it 4 semesters with 15 units/semester, weighing in at a grand total of $1,560. Throw in some fees, textbooks, and a parking permit, and you're close to 5% of a for-profit scam shop with superior training. Granted, CCSF probably has a longer waiting list, but I'm sure their program is plenty good for LVNs, probably even RNs.
Well, sure. You obviously would want to go to UCSF - it's the getting in that's hard. You go to a for-profit when your other options are eliminated. (My wife was fortunate to get into UCSF for pharmacy, and her education and degree have served her well.) The lower pass rate from the for-profits is probably both a function of a less educated applicant pool and the lower quality education. But I don't think the *fees* are excessive when compared with UCSF.
I think that's really my point, though. An extremely prestigious public university, offering an advanced degree (and medical insurance included in those fee totals), is comparable in cost (per year) to for-profits that have come under attack for shady business practices and bad training?
You can't really compare fees without looking at what those expenses get you. UCSF is probably worth the cost. A no-name school with questionable teaching practices, low licensure pass rates, low job placement rates, and extremely high student loan default rates? The fees shouldn't even be comprable.
You're comparing apples to piles of manure. An LVN is a few steps below the average UCSF nursing program, and an LVN without a degree will have to enroll in a special program just to be eligible for the pre-RN coursework.
LVNs are unlikely to make more than $30-40k/year. RNs are unlikely to earn less than $40k/year, and can earn quite a bit more in plenty of places.
Additionally, UCSF's RN tuition isn't that high, at least for in-state students. It looks like it's plenty expensive for doctoral programs, but that's kind of expected, especially from a top-notch institution.
Now, you want some real fun, try comparing pass rates on licensure exams: UCSF rates, well above average (all over 90%) vs. UoPhoenix. I can't find comprehensive stats for them, but their pass rate in Arizona is 78.4%. I'm willing to bet that UCSF grads have better employment opportunities and higher average earnings 10 years after graduation as well.
That said, you should acknowledge that UCSF is offering a valuable degree (and a high probability of passing licensing exams) for roughly the same price as a for-profit is offering... no degree, potential ineligibility to take the exams, and a very low pass rate.
Is that still true, though? More and more I read about how controversial papers could, if they don't get confirmed by the experiments of others, could "ruin" the careers of the authors. That arsenic based life hub bub a few months back had such comments swirling about it. Seems to me there is not much incentive to go against the grain anymore.
Most of the stuff I've seen along those lines has been, well, let's just call it extravagant claims with questionable evidence. Nothing like getting caught blatantly faking data to ruin a career.
That said, I really don't buy this. Maybe it's a problem in some fields, but I haven't seen a lot of evidence for it.
Largely irrelevant depending on the argument being made.
There is a small set of things which cannot, by definition, exist. Example: a two-dimensional square circle. We don't need any evidence to discard the possibility of its existence other than the definitions of the terms.
Depending on the definition used, many Abrahamic gods fall into this category. A god may certainly exist, but not the all-knowing, all-everything god that is both pure good and the creator of evil. The commonly accepted definition is so absurd that we can simply say "nothing can possibly exist with all of those characteristics".
Granted, every person seems to have their own definition for a god, but that simply complicates things further. Most of the descriptions I have heard are logically incoherent. Of the remainder, perhaps you could call me a weak atheist.
If you think that even begins to compare to what some of the for-profits are doing... wow.
You should really look into U of Phoenix and some of the nursing schools. We're talking about nursing programs producing not-yet licensed LVNs for ~$100k in tuition and fees... students who haven't even stepped foot in a hospital, learned how to interact with patients, give IVs, or operate basic equipment.
With the exception of certain "hard barrier to entry" degrees, I'd venture to say that most people who get degrees already were in the top 20% IQ wise and would have earned far more than median salaries, even without any kind of degree.
Been a while since I looked at the statistics on this, but I remember it being fairly untrue.
There is an IQ minimum for academic success, but it's somewhere around average. Let's call it IQ 100. Below that, most people don't do very well in school (or much else for that matter). Above that, GPA can be anything from 0.0 to 4.0, from IQ 101 through 160. Graduates aren't much smarter than average. People with average intelligence definitely get PhDs, and many very intelligent people fail out of school because they don't know how to work hard, delay gratification, manage their time, etc.
It doesn't matter whether you go to the Ohio State University, Harvard, DeVry, ITT Tech or ANY higher education institution. They ALL want your dollars.....they ALL try and get you in there no matter what including getting you to accept student loans. They ALL do this.....whether they are for profit or not. Anyone who doesn't think so is kidding themselves.
Man, where were you when I was doing college applications? I didn't think Harvard would be so eager to take me!
Wait, no, that's wrong, and so are you. They don't "ALL try and get you in there no matter what". Some are very competitive. Most decent universities are pretty selective in their admissions and only admit people they feel have a decent chance of succeeding in school. Yes, they take money, but that's not their primary objective. Many good universities receive significant financial support from alumni, and consider alumni to be a valuable resource. On the grad level, their marketing is in the form of papers authored, impact, and rankings by places like US News & World Report.
For-profit colleges, on the other hand, will usually take anyone. They know they're going to make a ton of cash in aid from the government, and they don't care if the students are likely to succeed. Additionally, they know the student loans are either guaranteed by the government or will not be dischargeable in bankruptcy. This creates a pretty obvious incentive system.
In every quantifiable metric I have seen, for-profit schools are worse than both public and private non-profits. Your argument that "they're all the same" is bogus largely because it ignores, well, everything important.
Without the full article it's hard to really follow why they think the earth needed excess organic chemicals, even specific amino acids, to be provided from meteorites. There is a large body of data that shows that amino acids, nucleic acids, lipids and a host of other moderately complex organic molecules could have been formed on earth at various times in it's development. As far as I can tell, there is nothing magical about the meteorite derived molecules and hence invoking panspermia (or more accurately, panorganicmoleculermia) is really unnecessary.
Anyone else out there with either access to PNAS or some better insight? So far it's a big meh.
I'd be glad to help, but it's not my specialty.
From the full text:
On the early Earth, on the other hand, the prebiotic inventory of reduced nitrogen necessary for the formation of N-containing biomole- cules has been difficult to predict. Although the hypotheses of a reducing atmosphere had initially allowed one to envision a considerable ammonia abundance as well as evolutionary path- ways for the production of amino acids (e.g., by Miller-type pro- cesses, 19), the current geochemical evidence of a neutral early Earth atmosphere (20 and references therein) combined with the known photochemical destruction of ammonia (21) has left prebiotic scenarios struggling to account for a constant provision of ammonia (22, 23). An abundant exogenous delivery of ammo- nia, therefore, might have been significant in aiding early Earth’s molecular evolution toward prebiotic syntheses and the data in this study, showing the capability of some asteroidal bodies to provide it, would make a reasonable case for exobiology.
In short, the commonly-espoused theory that Earth may have had an abundant, stable supply of ammonia is in question. This article provides pretty solid evidence that meteorites may have delivered some of the required building blocks. They're not saying "zomg, panspermia!"... they're just providing some new evidence that suggests it is possible.
Even if you buy the argument that Maddow is entirely ego-driven, you can't ignore the difference in the factiness (or truthiness, if you will) of her reporting. Her analysis is sometimes incorrect, but she tends to accurately report the facts, and pretty consistently at that. Contrast with Beck/Limbaugh.
Anyone who accurately reports the facts and makes an honest attempt at analysis is on the side of the people. Even when wrong, they stir valuable debate. Beck/Limbaugh are absolutely guilty of fear-mongering with blatant lies, Maddow is not.
Incidentally, I was just watching the remake of "The Day the Earth Stood Still" and reading your post makes me think that probably a major 'Carrington Event' would probably do a good (?) lot more than just turning some gear into expensive junk.
It wouldn't burn the Earth or anything like that, but it'd certainly turn a lot of gear into expensive junk.
Granted, an event large enough to blow out transformers on the ground, as well as other infrastructure, would result in far more than a "little damage", but it wouldn't be an apocalypse.
NASA has an article on the Carrington Event that tries to put it into modern context. This is obviously something we should build our infrastructure to be able to handle (if possible), and I'm sure we will for at least 20 years after the next major event.
Instead of comparing a weak video, I'll cover one of the topics I feel Khan Academy covers very well: two-tailed vs. one-tailed tests in Stats. Khan Academy gives a great illustration of working through the problem, and tries to touch on the "why", but it doesn't compare to the in-person experience I had.
My experience with it was in an ~300-person lecture hall class. Despite this, the professor took multiple questions, calling on students by name, and reconfigured his approach when he realized where people were having trouble with it. He offered multiple explanations, multiple examples, and then went on to discuss the application to various fields. In Political Science, for instance, there have been issues with cheating, where people realized their results were insignificant with a one-tailed test but could get significant results with two-tailed and subsequently changed their tests to get results. Because of this, two-tailed tests are generally frowned upon.
Khan Academy can't gear the lecture towards a different audience (high school students vs. poli sci majors vs. pre-meds), and they can't adequately address field-specific concerns. By definition, videos can't re-tack and approach a problem in a different way based on feedback.
The videos are an incredible supplement, and they're better than most textbooks, but they absolutely could not replace the professors in 95% of my classes.
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Actually.. the longer it takes to develop the technology the cheaper the price/performance ratio and the less expenditure required. That's just how technology does it's thing. Getting stuff to orbit becomes ever cheaper and it becomes ever more efficient space propulsion with higher specific impulse, means it'll eventually be affordable to go hunting artefacts of early space exploration.
Means eventually the Voyagers will be stumbled upon by the interstellar equivalent of a Tuk Tuk and sold on the black market in some Kupier belt slum.
I think that's mistakenly equating technological advance with advances in energy cost and supply. Barring energy advancements we simply haven't seen yet (cheap cold fusion, etc.) I'm not so confident about this prediction.
This basically assumes that energy availability will continue to increase, based on some unspecified technological advancements, when we seem to be reaching plateaus or declines. We're exhausting many of our supplies and have failed to develop the new technology... we could simply collapse or decline.
The people saying we should do nothing are doing so mostly out of an ideological mistrust of government doing anything, but they are going to be very regretful when they realize the markets failed to see and prepare for a future that experts and government DID predict, and could have prevented or at least vastly reduced the severity of.
As much as I'd love to agree with you, this just isn't true. We look back on the Savings & Loan crisis and see how government could have prevented it. We look back on the great depression and see what the government could have done better. We look at the latest financial crash and know it could have been prevented.
Free Marketists, however, blame all of the above on government action. They blame FDR for the Great Depression. While they won't join us in our fight to end oil subsidies today, conservatives in 50 years will almost certainly be saying that government caused an oil crisis. They will claim that a truly free energy market would have corrected itself sooner.
No. If you take a test and score too low, you get rejected, so we've already established that you're allowed to discriminate by IQ / intelligence. If you're saying that it's discriminatory to disqualify people who score too high, then you can't justify disqualifying people who score too low, either.
Not necessarily. Or really at all.
You can discriminate for hiring on any factor that isn't protected. Race, gender, religion, etc. are protected by federal and usually state law. The protected factors can also be discriminated against when it's a bona fide job requirement: a casting director who needs a white male actor can't be sued for turning down a black applicant for the same acting position.
you have the wrong firmware installed, I suggest you upgraded it to submissive woman 36.D. Then you will have response like "only a BJ, you are a kind master" or
"you are so generous master, I will do the laundry after I swallow".
Not the wrong firmware, just insufficient user privileges.
That's your own fault. If you can't root it right yourself, perhaps you should hire an expert to do it for you?
Although the ocean does provide a convenient and unlimited source of cooling water
Another convenient fact about the ocean: no one lives there. A nuclear disaster will hurt fewer people, then.
Another inconvenient fact about the reactor on the ocean: San Onofre is about halfway between San Diego and Los Angeles (ok, not that far from the north county SD area, but still). You know how much international shipping goes through LA? Tourism to Southern California's beaches? I'll give you a hint: a whole lot of people and a whole lot of money would be at risk.
We're talking about several very large metropolitan areas within an ~50 mile radius, one major military base, and a huge chunk of California's economy. No insurer in the world will touch those risks.
Because this causes more slowdowns than anything else.
You've gotta be kidding me! You need to fix your hosts file. 127.0.0.1 loads faster for me than anything else.
One of the mantras of law enforcement is "sometimes you have to break the law to enforce the law." An example is speeding to catch drivers evading arrest.
That's just silly. Speed laws frequently have exceptions built in for law enforcement and emergency services. Ambulances, for example, may be allowed to exceed the speed limit by 10 mph when circumstances warrant provided they have lights and sirens on and follow certain other requirements. There's no law-breaking involved because the law specifically allows for that.
I imagine similar exceptions have long been carved out for police attempting to enforce laws, catch speeders, etc.
What the world needs is a way for bright kids to drop out of the overpriced educational treadmill without being suspected of having a chip on their shoulder. Or educated voters who give a damn, but the second item seems out of reach.
I think we can all agree there. We'll eventually see a correction in the education market... but it will have to be a systemic change. The problem isn't bright kids, though--they can do well with or without an education. Average kids are the problem. For people of average intelligence and no exceptional ability, missing that little piece of sheepskin really will limit their futures. As long as employers require degrees for many jobs, employees will have to get those degrees.
(Is it just myth that back when education was rare, presidents spoke intelligently, and now that education is universal, presidents speak only in blithering platitudes?)
I think it's really more about mass media and the changing style of news reporting. Yes, in Lincoln's days debates would go on for hours and politicians were expected to delve deeply into issues, know their shit, and deliver great oratory. These days, very few people watch full debates, debates are moderated to limit answers to ~1 minute, and the vast majority of people will only be exposed to 10-second sound bites from the debates. The incentive is for politicians to produce sound bites... so they do.
Doing research and publishing articles *is* a professor's job. There are professors who only do research and do not teach, but there are no professors who only teach. In fact, a number of professors work at research institutions which do not even offer classes. While teaching is probably the most publicly visible aspect of a university, the real mission of the university system is to create and propagate knowledge in general.
Community colleges... Plenty of universities have part timers who just teach a class or two and may have no real research requirements. The UC system had a proposal recently that would have allowed three tracks: teaching only, research only, and hybrid. I believe that failed, but I imagine it's been implemented somewhere.
Plus, there's Hogwarts. And I'm not sure the professors at Hogwarts actually teach, seeing as how Harry only knows a handful of spells after how many years?
I see this all the time. The bright kids today are going into law or the financial industry, because that's where all the money is. Why bother working your ass off in school studying hard subjects that involve math, when you can party your way through school, get a law degree or something in financial mumbo-jumbo, and make 3 times as much working for Merril Lynch? Not to mention not worrying about having your job shipped to India or China.
Overall I agree that our system is FUBAR and producing an oversupply of lawyers, bankers, etc., but... law school isn't easy. At least not the good ones.
From my experience, all I can say is that the top earners in law, finance, and similar fields are generally extremely intelligent people who also had to work their asses off to get to where they are. It's not easy... it's just a hell of a lot more remunerative than, say, civil engineering.
Also, lawyers are suffering from pretty high unemployment rates right now, and that's expected to continue for a long time to come. The economy is correcting (slightly), just not as much as it should.
If there's a significant nuclear event, don't even think about drinking that milk. It's the primary pathway for cesium and iodine.
Also, do you have a way to remove your house from the grid so that you'll be able to use the electricity you produce?
It's funny because what is happening in Japan is exactly why Nuclear Power is SAFE!
An earthquake 7 times more powerful than the biggest it was built for hit, and all that happened to the reactors that didn't shut down cleanly was a small amount of radioactive noble gases, which decay within minutes. Even if the cores DO melt, they're safely contained in ... wait for it... containment chambers!
Errm.. part of the concern is that the containment domes were damaged by the explosions. The fact that they are leaking means containment isn't working. It's still better than nothing, but the stuff's NOT contained.
Your post has several other serious flaws. First, the radiation released appears to be far more than "radioactive noble gases". Second, the issue wasn't whether the cores shutdown... the other reactors (Daichi #4, 5, and 6) had already been deactivated for maintenance. They were offline when the quake hit. The problem is that each reactor also houses a pool with spent fuel rods in it. These fuel rods have to cooled and are encased in zirconium... which oxidizes and breaks down when exposed to the atmosphere. This seems to have caused the H2 buildup and explosion. Problem? These aren't housed in the primary containment dome, and the explosion blew holes in the rest. Third, if these keep going, it'll be worse than a partial meltdown inside a contained reactor because they are NOT contained. Fourth, reactors 5 & 6 at Daichi could face the same fate if they don't find a way to get cooling in there, and this may be impossible due to radiation coming out of #4.
People don't realize the amount of engineering that goes into nuclear to make it safe.
I'm a pretty big proponent of nuclear power, but that's bull and you know it. An incredible amount of engineering goes into making nuclear safer than it used to be. It is not, by any definition, safe. I'm sure coal has killed more people, but let's not go misleading people here. Even with modern designs and safeguards, well trained operators, and routine inspections, nuclear accidents can and do happen.
Disclaimer: IANANP. Also, information about what's going on inside some of those reactors isn't 100% at this point. Last I checked, they couldn't even get cameras into them, so not even the IAEA or Japan know exactly what is going on or what the water levels are in the spent fuel pools.
Well, I can say you suck at marketing.
You've got us all talking about your game on a very popular forum, and you haven't even mentioned what the name of it is. I was interested, and might've bought it to try it out and give you some feedback.
No. The artificial distinction between "streaming" and "downloading" is another driver of piracy. Let me download the damn file and not have to deal with bandwidth issues and sucky Flash players. I'm probably only going to watch it once anyway.
I should be able to tell my computer, "Here's $5/month. Each night around 4am -- when I'm asleep and thus using no bandwidth -- download the latest Daily Show and have it waiting for me over breakfast." I could just about do this now for free with torrents and RSS.
O you could do it for free with Sick Beard right now.
Well, sure. Obviously UCSF (one of the best medical schools in the world) has a higher quality program. But they do have a LVN program, too.
Doing some digging around, their fees (http://registrar.ucsf.edu/registration/fees/nursing) are comparable with private schools in the area, and there's (less good) public schools that are much cheaper.
I couldn't even find an LVN program at UCSF. If you say they have one, I'll believe you, but all the programs I see there are for people who already have some training.
For LVN or CNA, it seems the most economical route, by far, would be to go to a community college. Those programs have the same low entry requirements as the for-profits, and CA community colleges charge a whopping $26/unit/semester. Since LVN at CCSF is an 18-month program, I'll just go ahead and call it 4 semesters with 15 units/semester, weighing in at a grand total of $1,560. Throw in some fees, textbooks, and a parking permit, and you're close to 5% of a for-profit scam shop with superior training. Granted, CCSF probably has a longer waiting list, but I'm sure their program is plenty good for LVNs, probably even RNs.
Well, sure. You obviously would want to go to UCSF - it's the getting in that's hard. You go to a for-profit when your other options are eliminated. (My wife was fortunate to get into UCSF for pharmacy, and her education and degree have served her well.) The lower pass rate from the for-profits is probably both a function of a less educated applicant pool and the lower quality education. But I don't think the *fees* are excessive when compared with UCSF.
I think that's really my point, though. An extremely prestigious public university, offering an advanced degree (and medical insurance included in those fee totals), is comparable in cost (per year) to for-profits that have come under attack for shady business practices and bad training?
Here's a link to a news story on GAO report about for-profit colleges using deceptive tactics. A rip-off report anecdote about Everett College.
You can't really compare fees without looking at what those expenses get you. UCSF is probably worth the cost. A no-name school with questionable teaching practices, low licensure pass rates, low job placement rates, and extremely high student loan default rates? The fees shouldn't even be comprable.
You're comparing apples to piles of manure. An LVN is a few steps below the average UCSF nursing program, and an LVN without a degree will have to enroll in a special program just to be eligible for the pre-RN coursework.
LVNs are unlikely to make more than $30-40k/year. RNs are unlikely to earn less than $40k/year, and can earn quite a bit more in plenty of places.
Additionally, UCSF's RN tuition isn't that high, at least for in-state students. It looks like it's plenty expensive for doctoral programs, but that's kind of expected, especially from a top-notch institution.
Now, you want some real fun, try comparing pass rates on licensure exams: UCSF rates, well above average (all over 90%) vs. UoPhoenix. I can't find comprehensive stats for them, but their pass rate in Arizona is 78.4%. I'm willing to bet that UCSF grads have better employment opportunities and higher average earnings 10 years after graduation as well.
That said, you should acknowledge that UCSF is offering a valuable degree (and a high probability of passing licensing exams) for roughly the same price as a for-profit is offering... no degree, potential ineligibility to take the exams, and a very low pass rate.
Is that still true, though? More and more I read about how controversial papers could, if they don't get confirmed by the experiments of others, could "ruin" the careers of the authors. That arsenic based life hub bub a few months back had such comments swirling about it. Seems to me there is not much incentive to go against the grain anymore.
Most of the stuff I've seen along those lines has been, well, let's just call it extravagant claims with questionable evidence. Nothing like getting caught blatantly faking data to ruin a career.
That said, I really don't buy this. Maybe it's a problem in some fields, but I haven't seen a lot of evidence for it.
Largely irrelevant depending on the argument being made.
There is a small set of things which cannot, by definition, exist. Example: a two-dimensional square circle. We don't need any evidence to discard the possibility of its existence other than the definitions of the terms.
Depending on the definition used, many Abrahamic gods fall into this category. A god may certainly exist, but not the all-knowing, all-everything god that is both pure good and the creator of evil. The commonly accepted definition is so absurd that we can simply say "nothing can possibly exist with all of those characteristics".
Granted, every person seems to have their own definition for a god, but that simply complicates things further. Most of the descriptions I have heard are logically incoherent. Of the remainder, perhaps you could call me a weak atheist.
If you think that even begins to compare to what some of the for-profits are doing... wow.
You should really look into U of Phoenix and some of the nursing schools. We're talking about nursing programs producing not-yet licensed LVNs for ~$100k in tuition and fees... students who haven't even stepped foot in a hospital, learned how to interact with patients, give IVs, or operate basic equipment.
Correlation is not causation.
With the exception of certain "hard barrier to entry" degrees, I'd venture to say that most people who get degrees already were in the top 20% IQ wise and would have earned far more than median salaries, even without any kind of degree.
Been a while since I looked at the statistics on this, but I remember it being fairly untrue.
There is an IQ minimum for academic success, but it's somewhere around average. Let's call it IQ 100. Below that, most people don't do very well in school (or much else for that matter). Above that, GPA can be anything from 0.0 to 4.0, from IQ 101 through 160. Graduates aren't much smarter than average. People with average intelligence definitely get PhDs, and many very intelligent people fail out of school because they don't know how to work hard, delay gratification, manage their time, etc.
It doesn't matter whether you go to the Ohio State University, Harvard, DeVry, ITT Tech or ANY higher education institution. They ALL want your dollars.....they ALL try and get you in there no matter what including getting you to accept student loans. They ALL do this.....whether they are for profit or not. Anyone who doesn't think so is kidding themselves.
Man, where were you when I was doing college applications? I didn't think Harvard would be so eager to take me!
Wait, no, that's wrong, and so are you. They don't "ALL try and get you in there no matter what". Some are very competitive. Most decent universities are pretty selective in their admissions and only admit people they feel have a decent chance of succeeding in school. Yes, they take money, but that's not their primary objective. Many good universities receive significant financial support from alumni, and consider alumni to be a valuable resource. On the grad level, their marketing is in the form of papers authored, impact, and rankings by places like US News & World Report.
For-profit colleges, on the other hand, will usually take anyone. They know they're going to make a ton of cash in aid from the government, and they don't care if the students are likely to succeed. Additionally, they know the student loans are either guaranteed by the government or will not be dischargeable in bankruptcy. This creates a pretty obvious incentive system.
In every quantifiable metric I have seen, for-profit schools are worse than both public and private non-profits. Your argument that "they're all the same" is bogus largely because it ignores, well, everything important.
Without the full article it's hard to really follow why they think the earth needed excess organic chemicals, even specific amino acids, to be provided from meteorites. There is a large body of data that shows that amino acids, nucleic acids, lipids and a host of other moderately complex organic molecules could have been formed on earth at various times in it's development. As far as I can tell, there is nothing magical about the meteorite derived molecules and hence invoking panspermia (or more accurately, panorganicmoleculermia) is really unnecessary.
Anyone else out there with either access to PNAS or some better insight? So far it's a big meh.
I'd be glad to help, but it's not my specialty.
From the full text:
On the early Earth, on the other hand, the prebiotic inventory of reduced nitrogen necessary for the formation of N-containing biomole- cules has been difficult to predict. Although the hypotheses of a reducing atmosphere had initially allowed one to envision a considerable ammonia abundance as well as evolutionary path- ways for the production of amino acids (e.g., by Miller-type pro- cesses, 19), the current geochemical evidence of a neutral early Earth atmosphere (20 and references therein) combined with the known photochemical destruction of ammonia (21) has left prebiotic scenarios struggling to account for a constant provision of ammonia (22, 23). An abundant exogenous delivery of ammo- nia, therefore, might have been significant in aiding early Earth’s molecular evolution toward prebiotic syntheses and the data in this study, showing the capability of some asteroidal bodies to provide it, would make a reasonable case for exobiology.
In short, the commonly-espoused theory that Earth may have had an abundant, stable supply of ammonia is in question. This article provides pretty solid evidence that meteorites may have delivered some of the required building blocks. They're not saying "zomg, panspermia!"... they're just providing some new evidence that suggests it is possible.
They're all the same! yawn yawn yawn
Even if you buy the argument that Maddow is entirely ego-driven, you can't ignore the difference in the factiness (or truthiness, if you will) of her reporting. Her analysis is sometimes incorrect, but she tends to accurately report the facts, and pretty consistently at that. Contrast with Beck/Limbaugh.
Anyone who accurately reports the facts and makes an honest attempt at analysis is on the side of the people. Even when wrong, they stir valuable debate. Beck/Limbaugh are absolutely guilty of fear-mongering with blatant lies, Maddow is not.
Incidentally, I was just watching the remake of "The Day the Earth Stood Still" and reading your post makes me think that probably a major 'Carrington Event' would probably do a good (?) lot more than just turning some gear into expensive junk.
It wouldn't burn the Earth or anything like that, but it'd certainly turn a lot of gear into expensive junk.
Granted, an event large enough to blow out transformers on the ground, as well as other infrastructure, would result in far more than a "little damage", but it wouldn't be an apocalypse.
NASA has an article on the Carrington Event that tries to put it into modern context. This is obviously something we should build our infrastructure to be able to handle (if possible), and I'm sure we will for at least 20 years after the next major event.
Instead of comparing a weak video, I'll cover one of the topics I feel Khan Academy covers very well: two-tailed vs. one-tailed tests in Stats. Khan Academy gives a great illustration of working through the problem, and tries to touch on the "why", but it doesn't compare to the in-person experience I had.
My experience with it was in an ~300-person lecture hall class. Despite this, the professor took multiple questions, calling on students by name, and reconfigured his approach when he realized where people were having trouble with it. He offered multiple explanations, multiple examples, and then went on to discuss the application to various fields. In Political Science, for instance, there have been issues with cheating, where people realized their results were insignificant with a one-tailed test but could get significant results with two-tailed and subsequently changed their tests to get results. Because of this, two-tailed tests are generally frowned upon.
Khan Academy can't gear the lecture towards a different audience (high school students vs. poli sci majors vs. pre-meds), and they can't adequately address field-specific concerns. By definition, videos can't re-tack and approach a problem in a different way based on feedback.
The videos are an incredible supplement, and they're better than most textbooks, but they absolutely could not replace the professors in 95% of my classes.