I'm even more sad that so many Americans would STILL vote for this guy today simply because they're Democrats and that's that.
Low as my opinion of Obama is, I'd certainly vote for him again if he was running against the same two clowns as last time, or the two psychopaths from the time before.
This is why the solution, if Putin persists in this line of thinking, will involve a single bullet from a covert operative, not legions of troops or thousands of missiles.
I hardly imagine that that would matter, other than give his successor the "terrorism" excuse to do whatever he wanted.
Putin's cronies at the FSB put him into power. His successor isn't going to a have noticibly different agenda.
So you'd like to convert the discussion to why we have the kind of God we have instead of why we have the kind of universe we have? Maybe we have an infinite number of Gods, each slightly different?
Which is ironic since from what I've read they not only had bigger brains than most modern humans, but they also contributed a good chunk of DNA to Indo-European peoples...
Actually, to almost everyone outside of Africa, in varying degrees.
The idea that neanderthals are too dumb for cave art is just as rediculous as the notion that some humans are practically animals compared to other humans (what most racists believe).
I imagine that, prior to the discovery of evidence that they painted cave art, the argument was that there was no evidence that they had, not that they were unable.
No, there's a long tradition of viewing the Neandertals as "incapable of symbolic behavior". In the latest edition of Scientific American there's still a guy peddling the argument with moved goal-posts.
ISTM that Homo economicus is almost incapable of resisting the urge to cut corners in the design, construction, operation, and inspection of nuclear power plants. (And in non-nuclear projects as well, though few have the destructive potential of Cherynobyl.)
I wish the whole world was on nuclear powar, but our species simply isn't mature enough to "drink responsibly" when it comes to such things. And with the past few decades' huge increase in pressure to cut corners in order to maximize short-term profit, I suspect things will get worse before they get better.
As for the Chinese... have they hit on a better approach than capitalism, or are they practicing the Soviet-style corner-cutting that gave us Chernyobyl?
ISTM that Republican anti-science-ism is mostly limited to two areas, evolution denial and global warming denial. The latter is easily explained by the party's tradition of ruling for the benefit of Koch types (and having their campaigns funded by same), and the former is easily explained as an easy way to get religious traditionalists to vote against their own best interests.
You'd think expectations for "the plant's automation system" would be pinned down before the contracts were signed, let alone before construction started.
The Wikipedia article leaves the impression that the actual problem has been shoddy workmanship and poor project management.
FWIW, In my experience with small-time contractors in the petrochemical industry (back in the day), common practice was bid an untenable price and make the profit by finding or "finding" problems that had to be fixed at great expense, and with little ability for the buyer to bargain on the price. (And sometimes the findings are real; I have seen the blueprints showing a foundation with an 8' radius for a tower with a 10' radius, the problem not discovered until the crane tried to lower the tower onto the bolts in the foundation.)
Any chance to pin that on the content mafia or patent trolls? C'mon, at least ONCE such a story has to hit someone we can uniformly hate and not be controversial.
So long as you don't blame it on Tesla, Bitcoin, or Starts with a Bang, everyone here will cool with it.
The speed of light is a limit on how fast you can accelerate something *in* space, but it's not a limit on how fast space can expand.
In fact you can't even state the rate of expansion of space as a velocity, because the velocity apparent as the speed of recession depends on how far away you're looking.
It has a psychological effect because ignorant economists use limited knowledge about the universe to justify austerity policies. Friedman using TANSTAAFL, for example. Except now Dark Energy violates TANSTAAFL, and it didn't hold in General Relativity anyway. So we suffer from an artificially imposed scarcity of money because economists suffer from a lack of knowledge about the universe.
That's not rigorous enough for physics, but I do believe it meets the standards for good economics.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm even more sad that so many Americans would STILL vote for this guy today simply because they're Democrats and that's that.
Low as my opinion of Obama is, I'd certainly vote for him again if he was running against the same two clowns as last time, or the two psychopaths from the time before.
This is why the solution, if Putin persists in this line of thinking, will involve a single bullet from a covert operative, not legions of troops or thousands of missiles.
I hardly imagine that that would matter, other than give his successor the "terrorism" excuse to do whatever he wanted.
Putin's cronies at the FSB put him into power. His successor isn't going to a have noticibly different agenda.
And then Putin will start looking around for more real estate he likes. I hear there are a lot of ethnic Russians in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia....
Which have been NATO countries for a decade. The Soviet^w^w Russia will have a bit more trouble getting them back.
In fact, Putin may be making his play for Ukrania now, lest it also slip permanently beyond his reach.
What is it with all these short leaders and their need for military conquests? Compensating for something less publically visible?
that we've lost in the hippie 70s, whi
right : cost cutting and other profit gaining strategies are hippie inventions
Well, it's a fact that hippies didn't have any money.
So you'd like to convert the discussion to why we have the kind of God we have instead of why we have the kind of universe we have? Maybe we have an infinite number of Gods, each slightly different?
Which is ironic since from what I've read they not only had bigger brains than most modern humans, but they also contributed a good chunk of DNA to Indo-European peoples...
Actually, to almost everyone outside of Africa, in varying degrees.
I imagine that, prior to the discovery of evidence that they painted cave art, the argument was that there was no evidence that they had, not that they were unable.
No, there's a long tradition of viewing the Neandertals as "incapable of symbolic behavior". In the latest edition of Scientific American there's still a guy peddling the argument with moved goal-posts.
ISTM that Homo economicus is almost incapable of resisting the urge to cut corners in the design, construction, operation, and inspection of nuclear power plants. (And in non-nuclear projects as well, though few have the destructive potential of Cherynobyl.)
I wish the whole world was on nuclear powar, but our species simply isn't mature enough to "drink responsibly" when it comes to such things. And with the past few decades' huge increase in pressure to cut corners in order to maximize short-term profit, I suspect things will get worse before they get better.
As for the Chinese... have they hit on a better approach than capitalism, or are they practicing the Soviet-style corner-cutting that gave us Chernyobyl?
ISTM that Republican anti-science-ism is mostly limited to two areas, evolution denial and global warming denial. The latter is easily explained by the party's tradition of ruling for the benefit of Koch types (and having their campaigns funded by same), and the former is easily explained as an easy way to get religious traditionalists to vote against their own best interests.
It's not just software projects that that can't be completed in a timely, cost-effective manner.
You'd think expectations for "the plant's automation system" would be pinned down before the contracts were signed, let alone before construction started.
The Wikipedia article leaves the impression that the actual problem has been shoddy workmanship and poor project management.
FWIW, In my experience with small-time contractors in the petrochemical industry (back in the day), common practice was bid an untenable price and make the profit by finding or "finding" problems that had to be fixed at great expense, and with little ability for the buyer to bargain on the price. (And sometimes the findings are real; I have seen the blueprints showing a foundation with an 8' radius for a tower with a 10' radius, the problem not discovered until the crane tried to lower the tower onto the bolts in the foundation.)
Any chance to pin that on the content mafia or patent trolls? C'mon, at least ONCE such a story has to hit someone we can uniformly hate and not be controversial.
So long as you don't blame it on Tesla, Bitcoin, or Starts with a Bang, everyone here will cool with it.
FWIW, windmills and skyscrapers kill a lot of birds too.
And automobiles, for that matter.
Why not skip all the expensive equipment and just use birds for fuel?
Apparently they think it's ok to put your fingers in, so long as you pay.
according the some billboard on I-35 the bible says the world will end in 2017
Does it say when we can start looting?
Tunguska, Chelyabinsk, you see the pattern.
The heavens punish always those evil comunists.
Yes! At Tunguska, even before they existed!
I wasn't particularly worried about a 2880pocalypse to begin with.
What chemicals spilled, other than all the radioactive water?
And since when have people not been interested in the effects of chemical spills, genetic or otherwise?
By not studying the narrow strip of land that was affected by the tsunami.
Bah, you're making the radical assumption that scientists have a clue about the things they study.
Yes, if there's a reactor meltdown in your neighborhood you should stay put and ignore the panic mongers. A little radiation never did anything.
No, my life would have been changed (i.e., ended in the cosmic collapse) if I *had* hit him.
The speed of light is a limit on how fast you can accelerate something *in* space, but it's not a limit on how fast space can expand.
In fact you can't even state the rate of expansion of space as a velocity, because the velocity apparent as the speed of recession depends on how far away you're looking.
It has a psychological effect because ignorant economists use limited knowledge about the universe to justify austerity policies. Friedman using TANSTAAFL, for example. Except now Dark Energy violates TANSTAAFL, and it didn't hold in General Relativity anyway. So we suffer from an artificially imposed scarcity of money because economists suffer from a lack of knowledge about the universe.
That's not rigorous enough for physics, but I do believe it meets the standards for good economics.