Lars, do you mean you? Do you have any idea of the energy you're using to be online, to post, to play games? Do you have any idea of the energy that was used to manufacture the plastics, metals, and silicon that make up your computer? That monitor you're staring at is a toxic wasteland of unhealthy materials, stray EM radiation, and energy usages.
We don't need to reduce energy usage...we need to use energy smarter. That means green power, more efficient appliances, that kind of thing...but I presume going in that you need the energy you're using. If you don't accept that, you're opening the door for all kinds of schemes to "prove" that you need the energy you're using...and I don't think you'd like what's down that road much.
The lives of billions of people could be improved radically TODAY via renewable energy.
It doesn't take fears of Armageddon hitting 50 years down the line to motivate people to adopt renewable energy.
Now this adequately summarizes where I am on the whole thing. Any engineer worth his salt shoudl agree that waste and inefficiency are just silly. Oil's too danged valuable to burn....let's make houses more efficient, explore better and cleaner ways to make electricity. Technology will solve the problem; it always does.
If that makes the folks who are worried about C02 happy as well, excellent. If not...well, at least it's a smarter and cleaner industrial base.
Don't worry though. The Greenies will scream about some obsolete study that "proves" the Sun can't be causing this, or perhaps tout their latest theory that it's just coincidence.
Of course, there are signs that all the planets are warming, even Pluto. Unlikely there are 9 coincidences....
You've several bad, invalid, or just plain silly things in there, drix.
First, you're clearly not a hunter of any kind or you'd know that an AK-47 is a poor hunting rifle. It's really far too light a round and lack the necessary range; it's mostly designed to kill/wound people. It happens to be my favorite rifle, but I'd never take it hunting unless I was wandering around in some post-apocalyptic world where that was all I had with me. Might want to learn something about what you're talking about so you don't look silly.
Second, as I read the notes from the Lefties you're not "asking" anybody to change they're lifestyles--you're proposing to force them to do so. I've seen everything from mandatory fines to capital offenses for driving cars on these forums (I hope that last one was a joke, but you never can tell with most of the Slashdot crowd). It worries me muchness when people who think they know better than me insist on "helping" me, even when I don't want it.
Third, given that many on your side are proposing the use of force to make people march towards their grand world vision, equating that with facism, socialism, or communism doesn't really seem out of place at all.
I don't really think race is a factor for most folks any more...if I thought Obama was the better candidate, I'd vote for him. Rice also could be a serious candidate.
Most folks I know don't really care much about race any more, that's mostly older, WW2-generation people who were raised in that culture. I think just about anybody from the '60s on (except those in hard-core racist areas, I guess) are much less caring about these things.
Not really....I remember a study on this somewhere (but danged if I know where). Virtually all of the carbon that went into oil is from plant life (well, and bugs I would guess). Not really many dinosaurs in the mix.
One year I did the taxes with both TaxCut and TurboTax to see which one I felt was easier to use. TaxCut was cheaper but I didn't understand how it went through its deducation interview process....seemed to me it missed some things. It had a much better interface for recording donations though.
In the end I went with TurboTax, if only because I understood how it got what it got.
I've used VI ever since I discovered it in 1990....can't imagine going back.
It's clunky, non-intuitive, and frustrating...and enormously powerful, super fast, and doesn't take my hands off the keyboard. I don't know a fraction of the commands available but my *fingers* do, and I'm constantly astonishing those I work with by how fast I can edit something with VI while they're still bringing up nedit.
You won't find "conserving energy resources" in the Constitution. It's a fine idea, and one which I whole-heartedly think that various private organizations, trade groups, even local governments if their citizens demand it, should get behind--but it's not something the Feds should do.
People do act rationally. They might not act the way you want, but of themselves they act with reason and purpose for the most part. Tom Jefferson must be spinning in his grave to hear your position....
...and yet your signature DOES attack the messenger rather than the message, with your snarky "...Too much (oil-) money is at stake to take action..."
You use oil every day. You used it to post your missive, and to attribute a lack of what you deem to be sufficient action to that of oil company profits.
Focus on the facts. What do the theories predict, and what does the data suggest? What's the simplest, best explanation (Occam's Razor) that fits these facts? How can the theory be tested, if at all?
Let's also note that since global warming hasn't been remotely proven to any true scientists' satisfaction, one possible option is "spend nothing because there's nothing to spend it on".
Fundamentally the universe isn't old enough yet to have any (or many...I guess somewhere out there might be one or two) higher-element stars. From the stars' point of view most heavier elements are "trash" in one form or another...if they're made largely by previous stars fusion process and/or when they supernova you can't have any significant amount of heavier elements until a first generation star burns through its fuel, blows up, forms a second-gen star, IT blows up, etc.
I think I read that right now the universe is mostly second and third generation stars (including our sun). Got a ways to go yet before there are enough heavier elements out there to make a significant difference.
I'm astonished at the horrible packaging compact fluorescent light bulbs (you know, the ones you can replace the older incandescent ones with) come in. HEAVY duty plastic, very difficult to slice open...I'm always worried that I'm going to break a bulb or two. Why can't they come in a simple cardboard container like older-style lightbulbs?
Very well said, MoneyT....I was this close to posting something very similar when I saw your missive.
I think people are used to thinking of credit cards as "their money" since it's become so interchangeable (many folks in the larger cities use them exclusively) with cash and, frankly, often easier to use (I'm thinking of things like pre-pay gas pumps and the like). But as you note it isn't their money, they're borrowing it...and that's why the credit card companies want to keep careful track of what you buy. The bank does the same thing when you get a home loan, as you would expect when you're asking for, say, $300,000....it's just more jarring when it's for a $1.59 beef stick.
>The program does indeed break the law. Only two points remain in-the-air - Who >authorized it, and will Congress make similar future programs legal.
Actually no, it doesn't. The laws authorizing what the President can or can't do regarding wiretaps after September 11th is pretty broad; the most casual reading of it makes it clear he has this power.
Is it stupid to do this? Oh yeah...especially if you're going to try to deny it when somebody finds out. It is illegal? Nope.
Oddly enough at no point did I ever think Gore was going to have a landslide...frankly I was astonished he did as well as he did.
The Supreme Court remark is typical revisionist history. They didn't vote in any way regarding who was the winner, they made two determinations:
That every county in Florida had to have the same rules for a recount,
whatever those rules were (you had Demos wanting to count military in one
area and not the other, for example). They voted 7 -2 in favor of this.
That there wasn't sufficient time for Florida to complete the task for
THAT PARTICULAR ELECTION before the Constitutionally-mandated cutoff date.
They voted 5 -4 in favor of this.
This made Bush the winner since his certified vote count was higher, but that had nothing in particular to do with it....
Ferretman
Slashdot Mirror
Lars , do you mean you? Do you have any idea of the energy you're using to be online, to post, to play games? Do you have any idea of the energy that was used to manufacture the plastics, metals, and silicon that make up your computer? That monitor you're staring at is a toxic wasteland of unhealthy materials, stray EM radiation, and energy usages.
We don't need to reduce energy usage...we need to use energy smarter. That means green power, more efficient appliances, that kind of thing...but I presume going in that you need the energy you're using. If you don't accept that, you're opening the door for all kinds of schemes to "prove" that you need the energy you're using...and I don't think you'd like what's down that road much.
Ferretman
The lives of billions of people could be improved radically TODAY via renewable energy. It doesn't take fears of Armageddon hitting 50 years down the line to motivate people to adopt renewable energy.
Now this adequately summarizes where I am on the whole thing. Any engineer worth his salt shoudl agree that waste and inefficiency are just silly. Oil's too danged valuable to burn....let's make houses more efficient, explore better and cleaner ways to make electricity. Technology will solve the problem; it always does.
If that makes the folks who are worried about C02 happy as well, excellent. If not...well, at least it's a smarter and cleaner industrial base.
Ferretman
BTW, you fulfilled my expectation that there would be an ad-hominem directed at the researcher in question within the first ten replies.
Yeah, I was pretty sure that would happen too. Sigh.
These guys can't debate so they resort to attacks. It's sad. Predicatable, but sad.
Ferretman
Well said AC.
Don't worry though. The Greenies will scream about some obsolete study that "proves" the Sun can't be causing this, or perhaps tout their latest theory that it's just coincidence.
Of course, there are signs that all the planets are warming, even Pluto. Unlikely there are 9 coincidences....
Ferretman
You've several bad, invalid, or just plain silly things in there, drix.
First, you're clearly not a hunter of any kind or you'd know that an AK-47 is a poor hunting rifle. It's really far too light a round and lack the necessary range; it's mostly designed to kill/wound people. It happens to be my favorite rifle, but I'd never take it hunting unless I was wandering around in some post-apocalyptic world where that was all I had with me. Might want to learn something about what you're talking about so you don't look silly.
Second, as I read the notes from the Lefties you're not "asking" anybody to change they're lifestyles--you're proposing to force them to do so. I've seen everything from mandatory fines to capital offenses for driving cars on these forums (I hope that last one was a joke, but you never can tell with most of the Slashdot crowd). It worries me muchness when people who think they know better than me insist on "helping" me, even when I don't want it.
Third, given that many on your side are proposing the use of force to make people march towards their grand world vision, equating that with facism, socialism, or communism doesn't really seem out of place at all.
Ferretman
Both of those would be immediate disqualifiers for me, I'm afraid.
Ferretman
I don't really think race is a factor for most folks any more...if I thought Obama was the better candidate, I'd vote for him. Rice also could be a serious candidate.
Most folks I know don't really care much about race any more, that's mostly older, WW2-generation people who were raised in that culture. I think just about anybody from the '60s on (except those in hard-core racist areas, I guess) are much less caring about these things.
Ferretman
Also, is oil really made from dead dinosaurs?
Not really....I remember a study on this somewhere (but danged if I know where). Virtually all of the carbon that went into oil is from plant life (well, and bugs I would guess). Not really many dinosaurs in the mix.
Ferretman
One year I did the taxes with both TaxCut and TurboTax to see which one I felt was easier to use. TaxCut was cheaper but I didn't understand how it went through its deducation interview process....seemed to me it missed some things. It had a much better interface for recording donations though.
In the end I went with TurboTax, if only because I understood how it got what it got.
Ferretman
I've used VI ever since I discovered it in 1990....can't imagine going back.
It's clunky, non-intuitive, and frustrating...and enormously powerful, super fast, and doesn't take my hands off the keyboard. I don't know a fraction of the commands available but my *fingers* do, and I'm constantly astonishing those I work with by how fast I can edit something with VI while they're still bringing up nedit.
VI all the way.
Steve
From the High, Snowy Mountains of Colorado
I think he's dead right.
You won't find "conserving energy resources" in the Constitution. It's a fine idea, and one which I whole-heartedly think that various private organizations, trade groups, even local governments if their citizens demand it, should get behind--but it's not something the Feds should do.
People do act rationally. They might not act the way you want, but of themselves they act with reason and purpose for the most part. Tom Jefferson must be spinning in his grave to hear your position....
Steve From the High, Snowy Mountains of Colorado
Here in the US...overseas they even pay more.
This all seems quite fair and equitable to me.
Ferretman
You use oil every day. You used it to post your missive, and to attribute a lack of what you deem to be sufficient action to that of oil company profits.
Focus on the facts. What do the theories predict, and what does the data suggest? What's the simplest, best explanation (Occam's Razor) that fits these facts? How can the theory be tested, if at all?
These are the marks of a true scientist.
Ferretman
In other words, people who would actually KNOW....are you implying that environmentalists wouldn't have a bias as well?
Steve
Hmmmm...your argument reminds me of Bush: "You're not helping by criticizing our war effort or our soldiers in Iraq."
Interesting tack you're taking here....
Steve
From the High, Snowy Mountains of Colorado
Let's also note that since global warming hasn't been remotely proven to any true scientists' satisfaction, one possible option is "spend nothing because there's nothing to spend it on".
Ferretman
They just asked a couple of obvious questions, dude. What are you, on the payroll of Greenpeace or Population Connection?
Steve
I live on a 30-acre, heavily wooded lot 5 miles back from the nearest road.
I doubt seriously that public transportation of any type outside of what was shown in Minority Report will ever work for me.
Steve
Fundamentally the universe isn't old enough yet to have any (or many...I guess somewhere out there might be one or two) higher-element stars. From the stars' point of view most heavier elements are "trash" in one form or another...if they're made largely by previous stars fusion process and/or when they supernova you can't have any significant amount of heavier elements until a first generation star burns through its fuel, blows up, forms a second-gen star, IT blows up, etc.
I think I read that right now the universe is mostly second and third generation stars (including our sun). Got a ways to go yet before there are enough heavier elements out there to make a significant difference.
Ferretman
I'm astonished at the horrible packaging compact fluorescent light bulbs (you know, the ones you can replace the older incandescent ones with) come in. HEAVY duty plastic, very difficult to slice open...I'm always worried that I'm going to break a bulb or two. Why can't they come in a simple cardboard container like older-style lightbulbs?
Ferretman
Very well said, MoneyT....I was this close to posting something very similar when I saw your missive.
I think people are used to thinking of credit cards as "their money" since it's become so interchangeable (many folks in the larger cities use them exclusively) with cash and, frankly, often easier to use (I'm thinking of things like pre-pay gas pumps and the like). But as you note it isn't their money, they're borrowing it...and that's why the credit card companies want to keep careful track of what you buy. The bank does the same thing when you get a home loan, as you would expect when you're asking for, say, $300,000....it's just more jarring when it's for a $1.59 beef stick.
Ferretman
>The program does indeed break the law. Only two points remain in-the-air - Who
>authorized it, and will Congress make similar future programs legal.
Actually no, it doesn't. The laws authorizing what the President can or can't do regarding wiretaps after September 11th is pretty broad; the most casual reading of it makes it clear he has this power. Is it stupid to do this? Oh yeah...especially if you're going to try to deny it when somebody finds out. It is illegal? Nope.
Lying to Congress under oath is the impeachable offense.....and which President did that?
Um....there's precious little discussion of volcanic contributions on that link, and it's hardly a neutral reference in any case.
An interesting site, but hardly a neutral one. Ought to find a better link than one that's the scientific equivalent of "because Al Gore said so!".
The Supreme Court remark is typical revisionist history. They didn't vote in any way regarding who was the winner, they made two determinations:
This made Bush the winner since his certified vote count was higher, but that had nothing in particular to do with it....
Ferretman