> I don't know what it is, but when you talk to other scientists about a topic, while they're excited about it, they don't predict doomsday even if it's possible. But when you talk to a climate scientist, it's the only thing on their mind.
Cosmologists predict a Big Rip. Solar scientists predict that the sun will swallow the earth. Some astronomers think we'll eventually get dinged by a killer asteroid. Epidemiologists are terrified by some of the strange disease that have been turning up over the past few decades.
The difference with global warming is that it's happening as we speak, not some distant or random threat.
> Is it as simple as the top Republican leadership protecting oil interests and everyone else just follows along
That, and the propaganda teat known as "talk radio". I'm shocked to discover what formerly intelligent people start believing when they get hooked on it.
> If these scienticians want to save the planet promote ecologically sound solutions to known problems. Just bellyaching so you can get more grant money to study how fucked up the world is doesn't solve jack fucking squat.
Then it must have made you happy to read that the scientists are testifying to the policymakers.
> Although My humongous 4x4 pickup truck is more or less out of neccesity, I don't think I would trade it for anything else (even if i didn't have a need for it).
> "As an aside, I'm also quite interested to see what the bible-thumpers eventually come to make of all of this." Bible thumpers will make of it what they make of every instance of evolution: God's hand at work. A 3 foot (or whatever it is) tall homonid isn't going to change their minds, given that there are many examples of evolution right in front of their eyes that they refuse to accept.
Actually, lots of them already dismiss Neanderthals and older species as humans with arthritus. Some make the blanket claim that the whole lineage represents just two species, cleanly divided into humans and apes.
I was amused to hear an anthropologist offer the same argument against this specimen...
> I don't know about anyone else, but I've been waiting since the discovery was first announced for a definitive answer on this matter.
Unless one side has just been sandbagging -- i.e., if there's actually good reason for the uncertainty -- it's doubtful that a single publication will provide a definitive answer.
> I remember reading somewhere that North Korea has enough artillery pointed at Seoul to do some serious damage to the city in a matter of minutes, before any sort of counterattack could be initiated.
Supposedly a huge mass of artillery, deeply dug in by 50 years of work.
If war breaks out, Seoul isn't a place you'd want to be.
The Saturnians haven't invented Slashdot technology yet, so all their bull sessions generate high-energy hot air rather than low energy moderation packets.
If you read the article you'll find that "these planets" refers to the gas giants. It's a specific phenomenon with as-yet unknown causes, not a general problem with understanding atmospheres.
> The lowest divorce rates, for instance, are in the disproportionately-athiestic New England states, whereas the highest rates are in the true-believing states of the deep South.
Very likely the latter (and several of the previously mentioned "domestic abuse, divorce, alcoholism, prostitution, and even abortion") isn't so much because the South is more religious per se, but rather because people in the South tend to subscribe to the more patriarchical flavors of religion.
> A lot of research is taxpayer funded. Shame if the taxpayers get the information without paying a "prestigious journal" publisher.
A few years ago the traditional middle-men in the weather forecast dissemination business tried to get the US government to stop making forecasts available for free on the internet.
> Once you've been in academia or the research world for a couple of decades, you'll truly understand how little peer review often means. In many respects, it's a popularity contest no different than that one would see between high school kids.
> Those researchers and academics who are most outspoken and sure they are correct end up being considered as such. As long as you consistently deny that you're wrong and insist that you're correct, many fellow researchers and academics will believe you, even if you're completely full of shit.
If you want us to think any of this is the norm rather than the exception, you should be able to deliver a big pile of examples.
Does this mean we'll be seeing criminal charges against others who subvert the voting process, say by shipping machines with different software than they submitted for certification, or trying to obstruct voting on election day?
The courts would never let something like that happen, no matter how glaring the discrepancies.
Court systems aren't about justice or fairness, they're about orderliness and predictability. They would find it necessary to sweep such a grand problem under the rug.
> Sure... acquiesce to the world's body politic and cease to become a sovereign nation. Sounds like a plan.
I know of a specific occasion when thirteen sovereign states acquiesced to the regional body politic, and few of the current generation of their citizens are complaining about it.
Have you ever heard of the concept of "enlightened self-interest"?
Re: If the Republicans own the elections...
on
Who won?
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· Score: 1
> The "men behind the curtain" pick the candidates. Kerry was probably 'selected' from the crop of democratic contenders because it was thought that he'd be the only one of the bunch with enough available material ('Vietnam Veterans Against Kerry', etc) to make a bush "victory" seem plausible.
I don't go for that conspiracy theory, but I do think he was picked (whether by a clique or by the natural workings of the system) because he was the most bland. Dean or Edwards might have actually provided some leadership.
Re: If the Republicans own the elections...
on
Who won?
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· Score: 1
> The Democrats lost in 2004 because they had a crappy candidate, and let the republicans control the debate.
The Republicans had a crappy candidate too...
The Democrats lost in 2004 because too many Americans are fools who think it's wrong to not "back the President" during a war.
Slashdot Mirror
> I don't know what it is, but when you talk to other scientists about a topic, while they're excited about it, they don't predict doomsday even if it's possible. But when you talk to a climate scientist, it's the only thing on their mind.
Cosmologists predict a Big Rip. Solar scientists predict that the sun will swallow the earth. Some astronomers think we'll eventually get dinged by a killer asteroid. Epidemiologists are terrified by some of the strange disease that have been turning up over the past few decades.
The difference with global warming is that it's happening as we speak, not some distant or random threat.
> Is there nothing the current administration won't do?
Raise the minimum wage? Admit Iraq was a fuck-up? Put the public interest ahead of its sponsors' interests? Recognize the reality of global warming?
> The new Stalinsim for the 21st Century.
More like, GW-denial is the Lysenkoism of the 21st Century.
> Is it as simple as the top Republican leadership protecting oil interests and everyone else just follows along
That, and the propaganda teat known as "talk radio". I'm shocked to discover what formerly intelligent people start believing when they get hooked on it.
> Got flame baited the first time, so here we go again: Three Points
Point 4: (related to 1-3). You can always find excuses to deny the undeniable, if you want to bad enough.
> If these scienticians want to save the planet promote ecologically sound solutions to known problems. Just bellyaching so you can get more grant money to study how fucked up the world is doesn't solve jack fucking squat.
Then it must have made you happy to read that the scientists are testifying to the policymakers.
> Although My humongous 4x4 pickup truck is more or less out of neccesity, I don't think I would trade it for anything else (even if i didn't have a need for it).
Bah, real men drive six-wheeled armored cars.
With a great big gun sticking out the front...
> "As an aside, I'm also quite interested to see what the bible-thumpers eventually come to make of all of this." Bible thumpers will make of it what they make of every instance of evolution: God's hand at work. A 3 foot (or whatever it is) tall homonid isn't going to change their minds, given that there are many examples of evolution right in front of their eyes that they refuse to accept.
Actually, lots of them already dismiss Neanderthals and older species as humans with arthritus. Some make the blanket claim that the whole lineage represents just two species, cleanly divided into humans and apes.
I was amused to hear an anthropologist offer the same argument against this specimen...
> Hobbits suffer from microcephaly but Trolls suffer from microphallus, which is quite different.
Is that the syndrome that makes guys buy humongous pickup trucks and drive 20mph faster than the flow of traffic?
> I don't know about anyone else, but I've been waiting since the discovery was first announced for a definitive answer on this matter.
Unless one side has just been sandbagging -- i.e., if there's actually good reason for the uncertainty -- it's doubtful that a single publication will provide a definitive answer.
> I remember reading somewhere that North Korea has enough artillery pointed at Seoul to do some serious damage to the city in a matter of minutes, before any sort of counterattack could be initiated.
Supposedly a huge mass of artillery, deeply dug in by 50 years of work.
If war breaks out, Seoul isn't a place you'd want to be.
The Saturnians haven't invented Slashdot technology yet, so all their bull sessions generate high-energy hot air rather than low energy moderation packets.
> Fisty Prost has a direct relation to weather patterns on celestial bodies.
No, you're thinking of frosty pist.
> But, we understand ours .
If you read the article you'll find that "these planets" refers to the gas giants. It's a specific phenomenon with as-yet unknown causes, not a general problem with understanding atmospheres.
> The lowest divorce rates, for instance, are in the disproportionately-athiestic New England states, whereas the highest rates are in the true-believing states of the deep South.
Very likely the latter (and several of the previously mentioned "domestic abuse, divorce, alcoholism, prostitution, and even abortion") isn't so much because the South is more religious per se, but rather because people in the South tend to subscribe to the more patriarchical flavors of religion.
> A lot of research is taxpayer funded. Shame if the taxpayers get the information without paying a "prestigious journal" publisher.
A few years ago the traditional middle-men in the weather forecast dissemination business tried to get the US government to stop making forecasts available for free on the internet.
> Once you've been in academia or the research world for a couple of decades, you'll truly understand how little peer review often means. In many respects, it's a popularity contest no different than that one would see between high school kids.
> Those researchers and academics who are most outspoken and sure they are correct end up being considered as such. As long as you consistently deny that you're wrong and insist that you're correct, many fellow researchers and academics will believe you, even if you're completely full of shit.
If you want us to think any of this is the norm rather than the exception, you should be able to deliver a big pile of examples.
> However, the way science is being taught in public schools today essentially teaches that there is no Creator.
Nor a Santa Claus or Easter Bunny.
Are we to quit teaching the truth because it does not support someone's traditional beliefs?
If so, who gets to decide which beliefs are sacrosanct and which are dismissable?
> RIAA filed a suit against University of Rochester and all of its students for "Helping those damn, dirty pirates infringe on our copyrights!!".
And the screenwriters for Planet of the Apes are now suing the RIAA in turn...
Does this mean we'll be seeing criminal charges against others who subvert the voting process, say by shipping machines with different software than they submitted for certification, or trying to obstruct voting on election day?
> Would it be enough for the Dems to recall him?
The courts would never let something like that happen, no matter how glaring the discrepancies.
Court systems aren't about justice or fairness, they're about orderliness and predictability. They would find it necessary to sweep such a grand problem under the rug.
> CS has become a joke, and most curriculum's resemble job training
Some of us are wondering what your school's writing curriculum was like.
> Sure... acquiesce to the world's body politic and cease to become a sovereign nation. Sounds like a plan.
I know of a specific occasion when thirteen sovereign states acquiesced to the regional body politic, and few of the current generation of their citizens are complaining about it.
Have you ever heard of the concept of "enlightened self-interest"?
> The "men behind the curtain" pick the candidates. Kerry was probably 'selected' from the crop of democratic contenders because it was thought that he'd be the only one of the bunch with enough available material ('Vietnam Veterans Against Kerry', etc) to make a bush "victory" seem plausible.
I don't go for that conspiracy theory, but I do think he was picked (whether by a clique or by the natural workings of the system) because he was the most bland. Dean or Edwards might have actually provided some leadership.
> The Democrats lost in 2004 because they had a crappy candidate, and let the republicans control the debate.
The Republicans had a crappy candidate too...
The Democrats lost in 2004 because too many Americans are fools who think it's wrong to not "back the President" during a war.