Yes, that's how it works here in Sweden, and has for the last decade or so.
Of course an open network allows you to switch ISP just by calling them (or indeed using a web page), and of course no equipment needs to be changed, what would be the point of an open fiber network if it did?
The fibre company (used to be city owned, but is now private) run the fiber network including end-points (CPE) and the ISPs deliver service. I can currently choose between eight different ISPs.
But yes, it takes several hours to change ISP, can't see why I'd need it to go faster though. (And of course, if you've ordered optional extras like IP-TV, instead of the CATV that comes with the system, that equipment has to be changed, but that's more on you.)
No kidding. Taliban blowing up the Bamiyan Buddhas = Cultural Vandalism. ISIS in Palmyra = Cultural Vandalism. Company charging for services rendered so they do not go out of business = I dunno, a better business model than their older one? Its not cultural vandalism though.
Why not? The Buddhas were the Taliabans to destroy, right? Same with Palmyra. ISIS took it fair and square, so why shouldn't they be allowed to blow it up to their hearts content? You're not against private ownership and the rights to do as you see fit with what you own, right? Right?
I mean, it's a lot cheaper to provide a few servers, than it is to make sure that Palmyra doesn't fall over on its own accord. Upkeep ain't cheap you know, just keeping the looter and vandals away is a serious burden, so why should ISIS have to pay for that, when they clearly don't want it to begin with and have a new "business model"?
So it's rather simple really, and I don't see what all the whining is about.
Or maybe, just maybe, it's a tiny little bit more complicated than that...
They don't need to do that, see: Germany, Portugal, Denmark as a few examples. Neither of them has as many base load plants as they need base load.
No, but that's because they use other countries plants (France, Spain, and Sweden/Norway respectively). Without ties into those other grids, they'd be in trouble. In fact, it's difficult to say one thing or another based on a single country in Europe as our grids have such a high degree of interconnection.
So, they couldn't get away with what they're doing without the rest of us picking up the slack. Denmark and Germany in particular are often pushed into negative pricing, i.e. they have to pay us to get rid of their excess electricity. Likewise when it comes to import. (And don't forget that Germany is still ca 50% coal. Dirty, destructive brown stuff at that.)
But here's the kicker: There are about 130,000,000 people who will vote in the next presidential election. Right now, Donald Trump has captured 10% of those votes. Do you think there are a lot of people who have been saying, "I'm going to wait to see what this Donald Trump is all about before I go out and actually cast a vote for him"?
If that is so, shouldn't the polls show a much wider spread? Surely those 130 million people are represented in the polls, or aren't they? Are polls historically that inaccurate in US presidential elections? (Yes I realise that the election is still far away, but that's not really what I'm asking here).
(All this said as a Swede who's somewhat to the left of Bernie Sanders, and doesn't have a real dog in the Trump vs. Clinton race, nor would---hopefully---be that affected by the outcome.)
Got you beat. I saw "Gluten-free low-sodium table salt" at the store.
Yes, but even the "low sodium" part is true as these table salts usually substitute potassium chloride for the more common sodium chloride. So they really are both "table salt" and low sodium.
That large concentrations of potassium aren't necessarily good for you either is another matter, but getting more is probably a good idea as most people don't get enough potassium compared to sodium.
this may be true in the state, but in Germany everybody can be a taxi driver. All you need is 1) a taxi driver license (it is different exams to the normal one) anybody can take the exams, 2) an insurance on the car which makes it a commercial car 3) if you do pay per kilometer a counter which is verified to be working and properly counting kilometer/seconds of wait by a german institution ("geeicht" - calibration) and 4) no prison sentence for certain crime IIRC.
It's basically the same in Sweden. Well the car has to be registered as a taxi. The taxi registration number plate is a different colour (black/yellow) so that the customer can be certain that it is indeed a taxi, i.e has insurance etc. Total cost to turn a car into a taxi is about $2500. You also need a taxi company, but that would be Uber in this case, and it's not onerous, the same as starting any other company/business basically. Then you're off.
But of course that was too onerous for Uber, so they tried to do it illegally here as well. They had to stop. Now they run their Uber X service in the major cities, and low and behold, they're neither cheaper, nor better than the regular low price taxi companies. I guess that the market has spoken, and prices couldn't really be pushed any lower.
No, no one's really worrying about rotors touching, it's the wake turbulence and down wash that's the problem. And it's a big problem. With smaller rotors you'll have an even sharper downwash when you enter it. So I'd be keeping my distance. 3 feet below is right out!:-)
Just design it to refuse to fly more than thirty feet above the current road grade, and ensure that it is designed to automatically find a spot to land when it gets below two minutes of charge.
[...]
This sort of design would allow for two (and in some cases, three) layers of traffic instead of one...
You can't really stack "helicopters" (which is what flying cars really are) nearly that tightly. So with only 30 feet of height you'll only have one layer. And you'll be blowing up a gale of dirt and debris from the roadway all the time, hitting not only everything beside the roadway, but also risk fliers behind you. The same is true of vortexes, you have to have sufficient horisontal as well as vertical separation. It's not for nothing that helicopters flying in formation fly either absolutely level, or in an ascending tail formation (US army used to say ships behind had to be 1-10 feet higher when flying in formation to not fall victim to wake turbulence).
Flying by pushing lots of air towards the ground make life a lot more complicated for others around you than you'd might think. Flying a "quad copter" instead of a helicopter doesn't change that much. Well, apart from the fact that engine failure in a quad copter means certain crash, no matter the height and speed, but with a helicopter and sufficient speed or height, you can at least auto rotate to safety. That won't work well with "cars" below or above you either.
In countries where the loser pays the legal fees, the person with more money is never taken to court because suing will bankrupt the little guy if he loses. I'm not going to sue for my $500 loss if I have a 10% chance of losing and he'll spend 30k defending himself. Loser pays means that poor and middle class can't seek justice at all.
Of course not. That would be stupid. And we're not stupid. First for a $500 loss (that the courts don't want to deal with, thank you very much, that's what insurance companies are for if it's that type of matter), there is a simplified "small claims" court proceedings, where costs are much less, and you pay your own lawyer if you want/need one.
For larger cases it's indeed loser pays, but there are set fees and a reasonableness standard. So you can't really "outspend" your opponent and hope to claim all that cost. That would again be unreasonable. But cases don't get that big in general, as there are no punitive damages. If you commit a crime you should be in prison, or you're fined by the state. Civil court is for recovering loss and compensation, not for winning windfalls. (This of course keeps down the number and size of cases).
Now, if you're the little guy against a big corporation then? Well, that's what the special courts and the "ombudsman" is for. If I have a $500 beef with a company as a customer, then there's a special industry "court" that sits and makes recommendations (that most companies follow) on just the paperwork sent in. If it's a more systematic violation then the consumer "ombudsman" will bring a suit on your behalf (i.e. the state does), and the ombudsman can also through the consumer department of the government levy fines (i.e. "Shape up or pay the fine").
Same goes for renters court (though that's a real court) and for e.g. insurance problems. All this sums up to a system where the average citizen has never seen the inside of a court room, or even know of someone who has. Even traffic accidents are settled between the insurance companies, as they understand that if they involve a court that only feeds the lawyers, for no real benefit to anybody else. And if you have a problem with the insurance company there's all the consumer rights above that you can avail yourself of before you even have to contemplate court.
Also, as part of e.g. home owners insurance you're covered for lawyers costs and verdict (up to a fairly large sum) in case you're sued, or need to be sued. Since most people will never use it, it's fairly cheap insurance.
This above is true for Sweden, there are similar systems in place in other places.
I have a different WTF - WTF is the EU flag doing as the Slashdot icon for a story about Norway? Norway isn't part of the EU - precisely because it has all that wonderful cash from oil exports.
Nope. Norway can't be part of EU because of all the fish export. The oil has nothing to do with it. And as all the countries that are part of EFTA etc. but not part of the EU, of course Norway is quicker to adopt any and all EU policies (much quicker than us, neighbours and we're members).
Norway is the only country I've ever seem where socialism is sustainable - forever spending more than your tax revenue works great if you have another source of revenue to make up the difference!
That's not socialism. Not by a long shot. Here in Sweden we've been "socialist" longer than the peasant Norwegians (who aren't really socialist at heart, but more farmer conservative, not an industrialised country at heart) and we both have a better social safety net, and better state finances than most of the rest of the world (tough we can't beat Norway when it comes to state finances, obviously). And that's without as much as a drop of oil to export. We export the products of our labour, and we're not going broke doing that.
and that doesn't include a bunch of PPL cowboys feeling pressured to go in marginal conditions, which this service would surely promote.
Exactly. The whole idea behind general aviation is that it's supposed to be "for fun". A bit like going cruising in your sail boat. If the weather's bad, you don't go, but watch a movie instead. It's not meant to be a mode of transportation, i.e. it's not a means for people who have to be somewhere specific at a certain time to get there, just so you don't have to deal with the added pressure to perform under sub optimal conditions.
As both pilots and sailors will tell you, many if not most bad situations start with pressure to go despite the weather being marginal, usually because you need to get back to work/school/the dentist/whatever. In fact we had exactly this in a small plane accident a few years back, whereby they CEO of a local company flew the employees (eight I seem to remember) to a conference and back. However, he pressed on home, despite marginal weather, since they all needed to get back for other business. Icing put a stop to that, with a complete loss of the aircraft and everybody in it. Now, he of course didn't charge anybody for the trip, so he was technically legal, but the accident board voiced their concern that this situation isn't really what a GA rating is for. If you need to be somewhere with money on the line, that's a whole other situation, that calls for a lot more sturdiness all through the organisation, not just the pilot.
"Ride-sharing" like Uber does it is a horrible idea for private pilots in small planes that can only end in tears.
Too much clean, renewable energy? That's a problem I'd like the US to have.
Not really. That is already a fact in countries like Denmark and Germany. It's bad for a whole host of reasons, both technical when it comes to distribution etc. and economic. In fact Denmark and German couldn't handle their large solar/wind-installations today, if it weren't for all us good neighbours to buffer their wild swings. (And Germany is still 50% brown coal, don't forget that).
The fact of the matter is that renewables that we have today at any scale (i.e. wind and solar) due to their intermittency and unpredictability only work when there is good storage. And there is no viable storage solution. So in order for them to work you need a big dependable base load that you can economically shut off and turn on at a moment's notice. About the only such technology available is hydro electric power. That's already been built out most places where it's feasible, and if you have it, you might as well run it (few places have the conditions but not enough water, as that's a condition). So with hydroelectric power you can have a couple of percent (10%-15%-20%) of wind/solar but not more. If you instead couple that hydroelectric power with nuclear you can have much more nuclear than you have hydroelectric power (say 20% of hydroelectric with 80% nuclear). And if you have nuclear you've sunk so much capital cost that you have to run it. So nuclear+solar/wind doesn't make sense, as you'd do better without the solar/wind in that scenario.
Whichever way you slice it, solar/wind is a bitch as soon as they reach any scale to speak of if you want the lights to always dependably stay on.
According to Wikipedia fully 50% of all rail transport was carried by electric traction world wide. As Europe is dense and highly industrialised I would imagine the figure for European rail to be substantially higher, so "majority" of InterEuro freight being diesel can't be nearly true.
I can't find any numbers for Europe but again Wikipedia says that electrification in Europe is "widespread". Since freight has to run at higher speeds in Europe (more congested tracks) the added power from electrical drive also helps. And it notes that in countries like Switzerland even electric shunts are common. They're not here in Sweden though. Shunting locomotives are diesel electric here, but those are basically they only diesel electric locomotives in use. The rest is electric, and has been for close to a hundred years.
Fun fact: The company behind the BBC micro, Acorn, then developed their own computer architecture, for their follow up computer, the Archimedes. The architecture was named after the company; the Acorn Risc Machine, or ARM, for short. It got quite popular as time went on...:-)
Reportedly they even used the BBC micro in the development of ARM.
Worse yet - there are people who honestly believe that the western countries and corporations aren't doing the exact same thing.
Yes, and they'd be more right than wrong. Does the west engage in propaganda? Does the west engage in marketing? Does the west try to suppress news and thinking that isn't to their liking? Yes, to all the above.
And that's not what we're talking about. What Putin is doing is an a whole other scale and akin to brain washing (if you spoke with an "average" Russian, like I have, and learned what they're told and what they actually believe, your head would explode...), where the people aren't allowed to freely discus matters that Putin decides shouldn't be discussed and aren't even allowed the very tools (access to facts, analysis and opinions) to do so. Dissent is met with a bullet to the head. And that's not an anomaly. Check out the world press freedom index. With Finland taking first place, the US still a respectable 41:st, and mother Russia at 148, out of a 180. If that doesn't summarise what we're talking about I don't know what.
So, like the Finn said. You're playing exactly their game; as they're quick to point out "so what, you're not perfect either". No, we're not, but we're so much better that we're not talking about the same thing any more. Only in the black and white world of absolutist Russia and their ilk, does "no one is perfect" translate to "so that means we're all equally bad, and mine is as good as yours". Nope. Not true.
Look, while I have problems with the state of many things in the USA, and I'm sometimes very vocal in my criticism, it is at least a system that can be criticised. As is eminently illustrated by the relative success of politicians like Bernie Sanders. In Russia he would have been forced to shut up, have gone into exile, or dealt with. These are not two systems and states of affairs that should be compared, and demed "equal". They're worlds apart.
Yes, I (and many others) argue that something does change, when proofs become so large that other human mathematicians can't check them.
The social process of mathematics is meant to adress the first kind of problem, i.e. determine that some proofs are incorrect. That's why they're written up and published they way they are. So that others can follow them and make their own judgement as to whether they're true or not. Only when we have a broad consensus from peers do we update our text books and pronounce something "true". (And in many cases we don't get that far, as the area/results aren't interesting enough to enough people, that they get any scrutiny).
But with computer generated proofs that can't be checked other than by another computer this process breaks down. And that's a problem. Perhaps mainly from a philosophical standpoint (that's why us computer scientists mainly ignore it), but then again, mathematics is philosophy (some say in its purest form), so one shouldn't take that step lightly, and without due consideration.
So, perhaps, in the future, mathematical arguments will all be made by contrarian AI:s, who will make arguments and hold debates that we mere mortals can't even begin to follow, but we're not there yet. Not by a long shot.
Yes. Don't take my argument to mean that I want to throw out the baby with the bathwater. I'm a firm believer in the use of computers in mathematics. I think we're only just scraping the surface of what's possible. (To add to your example: there's interesting work in statistics for example, where Monte Carlo type simulations have demonstrated that certain statistical tests are much more accurate and valuable, compared to others, on a wide range of different data. Results that were very difficult, if not impossible, to achieve with traditional analytical methods).
But as always, one has to beware of the "I have a very large hammer, so everything's starting to look like a nail"-bias. Computers are an invaluable tool for some situations like you say, and maybe not so hot for others, like you also point out.
Not so fast. There are severalmathematicians that don't necessarily agree with that statement. At least not in its strongest form. (We'll ignore the editor basing their argument on the wrong thing, of course being "satisfying" to a human has little bearing on the "proofness" of a mathematical argument).
In fact, whether computer generated proofs that are too large to check by human mathematicians are really proofs at all is a question that's alive (if not exactly well) in the mathematical community, and you'll find many mathematicians who will sneer at it. This based on the realisation that many so called proofs are wrong. The history of computer generated proofs and verifications in particular being littered with incorrect results (often due to a validation problem, rather than a verification problem, but the latter, due to bugs in the verifier are not unheard of). Hence, the need for some form of human verification. They don't call it "the social process of mathematics" for nothing. Like Jim Horning said: "A Proof is a repeatable experiment in persuasion." Now, if you need another computer to verify the first, you soon end up with a "it's computers all the way down-silly"-type of argument, that doesn't make more pure mathematicians feel exactly warm and fuzzy all over. (Us computer scientist we shrug and get on with it, but that's a different story.)
I didn't say it did. I said "IF you live your life scientifically", which in context means "you live your life based on scientific evaluation of every action and choose only that which is the most likely to provide the greatest good to the greatest number of people first, and then to oneself second." Skydiving, evaluated under such criteria, would never happen.
"Greatest good to greatest number of people" is not a scientific posture. It is a moral one based on utilitarian ethics. Science doesn't factor into it and scientism is unpopular for a reason...
And also, who are you to question someone else's utility of sky diving? We accept risk to reap the benefits. I assume that sky divers feel the benefits outweigh the risks.
As many times as that is repeated, it is still not true. Your children are at risk because of their own systems, not because someone in Canada chooses not to have their child vaccinated. If that unvaccinated child got sick, then the disease is still out there and your child can get sick, too, without ever coming anywhere close to them. Life isn't perfect. Children who aren't vaccinated aren't death threats to other people.
No. The whole idea of herd immunity is that when the disease cannot find a viable population, it isn't "out there" anymore. That's how we have been able to eradicate e.g. small pox through vaccination, to the point where we don't need the vaccination anymore. And my children can't get sick through unvaccinated children in Canada, that's not how diseases work. But those children in Canada can keep a disease alive and flourishing, so if you wish a case for their vaccination could still be made. And by your scientist reasoning probably should be, since you believe utilitarianism is all there is.
No, not really. "Science," as in free and unencumbered science was very sceptical of leaded gasoline from the outset. But industry funded "scientist" were adamant that it was safe. So, it serves as a cautionary tale of caveat emptor, complete with industry lawsuits of independent scientist and not to trust those with a demonstrated vested interest.
(***) Science now says that SSRI's are ineffective, despite being the go-to prescription medication for depression.
Nope, that's wrong to. Why and how SSRIs work is a complex issue, part of a complex problem. While there are one or two studies that do seem to indicate that the proposed mechanisms aren't the whole story, there is a substantial body of work that demonstrates efficiency for a large number of patients. But not all of them, or even a large part of them. So to say that the "science" is settled because of one or two studies is jumping the gun. Those studies are barely out of the starting blocks, while you claim they've won. Science doesn't work that way, esp. not in the biological/medical field. Remember, "one study is no study". And more recent studies aren't necessarily better (or worse) than twenty year old ones. Depression and the biological reasons for it, are much more complex than you give them credit for.
So, most, not to say many, of your examples, including Thiomersal aren't examples of "science" getting it wrong. They're examples, of news reporters, society, and you, getting the science wrong. Not the other way around. And given the general understanding and reporting of scientific matters I can't say I solely blame you.
If people understood the risk of skydiving, for example, and lived their lives "scientifically", nobody would ever skydive.
As an erstwhile rock climber, alpinist, and then and current scientist, I don't even know where to begin...
Science does not in any way shaper or form require you to live a life of risk minimisation. That's a philosophical question, and not one for science. What science can help you with is learning about the risk, and as our sense of risk is really, really bad, that's a good a necessary thing. Science can also help to point out that living is accepting risk. You have to weigh the benefit against the cost in everything you do. I made the decision for myself, that the benefits of climbing outweighed the risks. Others may reasonable make other decisions.
Now of course, that people sky dive, climb, cave dive or whatever, is a complete straw man and not at all analogous with refusing vaccine. I have no problem what so ever with you killing yourself doing what you want to do. So if you want to make a hole in the ground sky diving, be my guest. However, refusing vaccine for yourself doesn't just put yourself at risk, it puts me and esp. my children (who have difficulty getting certain vaccines due to medical reasons) at risk. Science tells me that, and that's something I have a problem with. And that you put your children at risk, who aren't you, that I also have a problem with, but not as great as said children putting my children at risk.
It was discovered that the amount of mistakes on code worked on during those pushes went up dramatically, and especially tellingly - during the last 4 hours of those 14-16 hour days, frequently working all weekend as well for up to 2 months.
And that's why USAF air craft mechanics do not work more than 12 hours per day, even during combat. Their bosses/officers, who will ultimately fly the planes, don't want them falling out of the sky due to simple and unavoidable mistakes. (It's amazing what management with true buy in will do to boost common sense in said management.)
And that's realising that even 12 hours is pushing it. Sixteen? Forget about it.
And it doesn't matter much since "all" workplaces fall under collective agreements, and if you try to run a business without signing that agreement, then you'll be boycotted by all unions (no services performed, no deliveries etc.) and many customers as well.
The odd american company tries to bring their corporate (anti-union) culture over here, but they've all failed spectacularly so far. The last I remember is Toy's R Us, way back when. They folded pretty quickly.
So in Sweden almost anybody could be a member of a union (take for instance the Swedish Officers Union for instance, for officers in the armed forces), but even if they aren't, it doesn't matter as a whole.
Now, of course, with this much power comes great responsibility, so unions are much more well behaved here. In fact strikes etc. are extremely uncommon, too uncommon some would say.
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, that's how it works here in Sweden, and has for the last decade or so.
Of course an open network allows you to switch ISP just by calling them (or indeed using a web page), and of course no equipment needs to be changed, what would be the point of an open fiber network if it did?
The fibre company (used to be city owned, but is now private) run the fiber network including end-points (CPE) and the ISPs deliver service. I can currently choose between eight different ISPs.
But yes, it takes several hours to change ISP, can't see why I'd need it to go faster though. (And of course, if you've ordered optional extras like IP-TV, instead of the CATV that comes with the system, that equipment has to be changed, but that's more on you.)
No kidding. Taliban blowing up the Bamiyan Buddhas = Cultural Vandalism. ISIS in Palmyra = Cultural Vandalism. Company charging for services rendered so they do not go out of business = I dunno, a better business model than their older one? Its not cultural vandalism though.
Why not? The Buddhas were the Taliabans to destroy, right? Same with Palmyra. ISIS took it fair and square, so why shouldn't they be allowed to blow it up to their hearts content? You're not against private ownership and the rights to do as you see fit with what you own, right? Right?
I mean, it's a lot cheaper to provide a few servers, than it is to make sure that Palmyra doesn't fall over on its own accord. Upkeep ain't cheap you know, just keeping the looter and vandals away is a serious burden, so why should ISIS have to pay for that, when they clearly don't want it to begin with and have a new "business model"?
So it's rather simple really, and I don't see what all the whining is about.
Or maybe, just maybe, it's a tiny little bit more complicated than that...
(Warning: The above post may contain sarcasm...)
They don't need to do that, see: Germany, Portugal, Denmark as a few examples. Neither of them has as many base load plants as they need base load.
No, but that's because they use other countries plants (France, Spain, and Sweden/Norway respectively). Without ties into those other grids, they'd be in trouble. In fact, it's difficult to say one thing or another based on a single country in Europe as our grids have such a high degree of interconnection.
So, they couldn't get away with what they're doing without the rest of us picking up the slack. Denmark and Germany in particular are often pushed into negative pricing, i.e. they have to pay us to get rid of their excess electricity. Likewise when it comes to import. (And don't forget that Germany is still ca 50% coal. Dirty, destructive brown stuff at that.)
OK, so you're saying the changes are recent enough to not show up yet. I'll keep my eyes glued to the polls then... :-)
But here's the kicker: There are about 130,000,000 people who will vote in the next presidential election. Right now, Donald Trump has captured 10% of those votes. Do you think there are a lot of people who have been saying, "I'm going to wait to see what this Donald Trump is all about before I go out and actually cast a vote for him"?
If that is so, shouldn't the polls show a much wider spread? Surely those 130 million people are represented in the polls, or aren't they? Are polls historically that inaccurate in US presidential elections? (Yes I realise that the election is still far away, but that's not really what I'm asking here).
(All this said as a Swede who's somewhat to the left of Bernie Sanders, and doesn't have a real dog in the Trump vs. Clinton race, nor would---hopefully---be that affected by the outcome.)
Got you beat. I saw "Gluten-free low-sodium table salt" at the store.
Yes, but even the "low sodium" part is true as these table salts usually substitute potassium chloride for the more common sodium chloride. So they really are both "table salt" and low sodium.
That large concentrations of potassium aren't necessarily good for you either is another matter, but getting more is probably a good idea as most people don't get enough potassium compared to sodium.
You have it backwards. It's severance pay. If nobody loses their job, the cost is zero.
And the fix is also easy for the company. Strike the non-compete. Doesn't cost them a dime for the people we're talking about.
this may be true in the state, but in Germany everybody can be a taxi driver. All you need is 1) a taxi driver license (it is different exams to the normal one) anybody can take the exams, 2) an insurance on the car which makes it a commercial car 3) if you do pay per kilometer a counter which is verified to be working and properly counting kilometer/seconds of wait by a german institution ("geeicht" - calibration) and 4) no prison sentence for certain crime IIRC.
It's basically the same in Sweden. Well the car has to be registered as a taxi. The taxi registration number plate is a different colour (black/yellow) so that the customer can be certain that it is indeed a taxi, i.e has insurance etc. Total cost to turn a car into a taxi is about $2500. You also need a taxi company, but that would be Uber in this case, and it's not onerous, the same as starting any other company/business basically. Then you're off.
But of course that was too onerous for Uber, so they tried to do it illegally here as well. They had to stop. Now they run their Uber X service in the major cities, and low and behold, they're neither cheaper, nor better than the regular low price taxi companies. I guess that the market has spoken, and prices couldn't really be pushed any lower.
No, no one's really worrying about rotors touching, it's the wake turbulence and down wash that's the problem. And it's a big problem. With smaller rotors you'll have an even sharper downwash when you enter it. So I'd be keeping my distance. 3 feet below is right out! :-)
Just design it to refuse to fly more than thirty feet above the current road grade, and ensure that it is designed to automatically find a spot to land when it gets below two minutes of charge. [...] This sort of design would allow for two (and in some cases, three) layers of traffic instead of one...
You can't really stack "helicopters" (which is what flying cars really are) nearly that tightly. So with only 30 feet of height you'll only have one layer. And you'll be blowing up a gale of dirt and debris from the roadway all the time, hitting not only everything beside the roadway, but also risk fliers behind you. The same is true of vortexes, you have to have sufficient horisontal as well as vertical separation. It's not for nothing that helicopters flying in formation fly either absolutely level, or in an ascending tail formation (US army used to say ships behind had to be 1-10 feet higher when flying in formation to not fall victim to wake turbulence).
Flying by pushing lots of air towards the ground make life a lot more complicated for others around you than you'd might think. Flying a "quad copter" instead of a helicopter doesn't change that much. Well, apart from the fact that engine failure in a quad copter means certain crash, no matter the height and speed, but with a helicopter and sufficient speed or height, you can at least auto rotate to safety. That won't work well with "cars" below or above you either.
In countries where the loser pays the legal fees, the person with more money is never taken to court because suing will bankrupt the little guy if he loses. I'm not going to sue for my $500 loss if I have a 10% chance of losing and he'll spend 30k defending himself. Loser pays means that poor and middle class can't seek justice at all.
Of course not. That would be stupid. And we're not stupid. First for a $500 loss (that the courts don't want to deal with, thank you very much, that's what insurance companies are for if it's that type of matter), there is a simplified "small claims" court proceedings, where costs are much less, and you pay your own lawyer if you want/need one.
For larger cases it's indeed loser pays, but there are set fees and a reasonableness standard. So you can't really "outspend" your opponent and hope to claim all that cost. That would again be unreasonable. But cases don't get that big in general, as there are no punitive damages. If you commit a crime you should be in prison, or you're fined by the state. Civil court is for recovering loss and compensation, not for winning windfalls. (This of course keeps down the number and size of cases).
Now, if you're the little guy against a big corporation then? Well, that's what the special courts and the "ombudsman" is for. If I have a $500 beef with a company as a customer, then there's a special industry "court" that sits and makes recommendations (that most companies follow) on just the paperwork sent in. If it's a more systematic violation then the consumer "ombudsman" will bring a suit on your behalf (i.e. the state does), and the ombudsman can also through the consumer department of the government levy fines (i.e. "Shape up or pay the fine").
Same goes for renters court (though that's a real court) and for e.g. insurance problems. All this sums up to a system where the average citizen has never seen the inside of a court room, or even know of someone who has. Even traffic accidents are settled between the insurance companies, as they understand that if they involve a court that only feeds the lawyers, for no real benefit to anybody else. And if you have a problem with the insurance company there's all the consumer rights above that you can avail yourself of before you even have to contemplate court.
Also, as part of e.g. home owners insurance you're covered for lawyers costs and verdict (up to a fairly large sum) in case you're sued, or need to be sued. Since most people will never use it, it's fairly cheap insurance.
This above is true for Sweden, there are similar systems in place in other places.
I have a different WTF - WTF is the EU flag doing as the Slashdot icon for a story about Norway? Norway isn't part of the EU - precisely because it has all that wonderful cash from oil exports.
Nope. Norway can't be part of EU because of all the fish export. The oil has nothing to do with it. And as all the countries that are part of EFTA etc. but not part of the EU, of course Norway is quicker to adopt any and all EU policies (much quicker than us, neighbours and we're members).
Norway is the only country I've ever seem where socialism is sustainable - forever spending more than your tax revenue works great if you have another source of revenue to make up the difference!
That's not socialism. Not by a long shot. Here in Sweden we've been "socialist" longer than the peasant Norwegians (who aren't really socialist at heart, but more farmer conservative, not an industrialised country at heart) and we both have a better social safety net, and better state finances than most of the rest of the world (tough we can't beat Norway when it comes to state finances, obviously). And that's without as much as a drop of oil to export. We export the products of our labour, and we're not going broke doing that.
and that doesn't include a bunch of PPL cowboys feeling pressured to go in marginal conditions, which this service would surely promote.
Exactly. The whole idea behind general aviation is that it's supposed to be "for fun". A bit like going cruising in your sail boat. If the weather's bad, you don't go, but watch a movie instead. It's not meant to be a mode of transportation, i.e. it's not a means for people who have to be somewhere specific at a certain time to get there, just so you don't have to deal with the added pressure to perform under sub optimal conditions.
As both pilots and sailors will tell you, many if not most bad situations start with pressure to go despite the weather being marginal, usually because you need to get back to work/school/the dentist/whatever. In fact we had exactly this in a small plane accident a few years back, whereby they CEO of a local company flew the employees (eight I seem to remember) to a conference and back. However, he pressed on home, despite marginal weather, since they all needed to get back for other business. Icing put a stop to that, with a complete loss of the aircraft and everybody in it. Now, he of course didn't charge anybody for the trip, so he was technically legal, but the accident board voiced their concern that this situation isn't really what a GA rating is for. If you need to be somewhere with money on the line, that's a whole other situation, that calls for a lot more sturdiness all through the organisation, not just the pilot.
"Ride-sharing" like Uber does it is a horrible idea for private pilots in small planes that can only end in tears.
Too much clean, renewable energy? That's a problem I'd like the US to have.
Not really. That is already a fact in countries like Denmark and Germany. It's bad for a whole host of reasons, both technical when it comes to distribution etc. and economic. In fact Denmark and German couldn't handle their large solar/wind-installations today, if it weren't for all us good neighbours to buffer their wild swings. (And Germany is still 50% brown coal, don't forget that).
The fact of the matter is that renewables that we have today at any scale (i.e. wind and solar) due to their intermittency and unpredictability only work when there is good storage. And there is no viable storage solution. So in order for them to work you need a big dependable base load that you can economically shut off and turn on at a moment's notice. About the only such technology available is hydro electric power. That's already been built out most places where it's feasible, and if you have it, you might as well run it (few places have the conditions but not enough water, as that's a condition). So with hydroelectric power you can have a couple of percent (10%-15%-20%) of wind/solar but not more. If you instead couple that hydroelectric power with nuclear you can have much more nuclear than you have hydroelectric power (say 20% of hydroelectric with 80% nuclear). And if you have nuclear you've sunk so much capital cost that you have to run it. So nuclear+solar/wind doesn't make sense, as you'd do better without the solar/wind in that scenario.
Whichever way you slice it, solar/wind is a bitch as soon as they reach any scale to speak of if you want the lights to always dependably stay on.
According to Wikipedia fully 50% of all rail transport was carried by electric traction world wide. As Europe is dense and highly industrialised I would imagine the figure for European rail to be substantially higher, so "majority" of InterEuro freight being diesel can't be nearly true.
I can't find any numbers for Europe but again Wikipedia says that electrification in Europe is "widespread". Since freight has to run at higher speeds in Europe (more congested tracks) the added power from electrical drive also helps. And it notes that in countries like Switzerland even electric shunts are common. They're not here in Sweden though. Shunting locomotives are diesel electric here, but those are basically they only diesel electric locomotives in use. The rest is electric, and has been for close to a hundred years.
Fun fact: The company behind the BBC micro, Acorn, then developed their own computer architecture, for their follow up computer, the Archimedes. The architecture was named after the company; the Acorn Risc Machine, or ARM, for short. It got quite popular as time went on... :-)
Reportedly they even used the BBC micro in the development of ARM.
Worse yet - there are people who honestly believe that the western countries and corporations aren't doing the exact same thing.
Yes, and they'd be more right than wrong. Does the west engage in propaganda? Does the west engage in marketing? Does the west try to suppress news and thinking that isn't to their liking? Yes, to all the above.
And that's not what we're talking about. What Putin is doing is an a whole other scale and akin to brain washing (if you spoke with an "average" Russian, like I have, and learned what they're told and what they actually believe, your head would explode...), where the people aren't allowed to freely discus matters that Putin decides shouldn't be discussed and aren't even allowed the very tools (access to facts, analysis and opinions) to do so. Dissent is met with a bullet to the head. And that's not an anomaly. Check out the world press freedom index. With Finland taking first place, the US still a respectable 41:st, and mother Russia at 148, out of a 180. If that doesn't summarise what we're talking about I don't know what.
So, like the Finn said. You're playing exactly their game; as they're quick to point out "so what, you're not perfect either". No, we're not, but we're so much better that we're not talking about the same thing any more. Only in the black and white world of absolutist Russia and their ilk, does "no one is perfect" translate to "so that means we're all equally bad, and mine is as good as yours". Nope. Not true.
Look, while I have problems with the state of many things in the USA, and I'm sometimes very vocal in my criticism, it is at least a system that can be criticised. As is eminently illustrated by the relative success of politicians like Bernie Sanders. In Russia he would have been forced to shut up, have gone into exile, or dealt with. These are not two systems and states of affairs that should be compared, and demed "equal". They're worlds apart.
Yes, I (and many others) argue that something does change, when proofs become so large that other human mathematicians can't check them.
The social process of mathematics is meant to adress the first kind of problem, i.e. determine that some proofs are incorrect. That's why they're written up and published they way they are. So that others can follow them and make their own judgement as to whether they're true or not. Only when we have a broad consensus from peers do we update our text books and pronounce something "true". (And in many cases we don't get that far, as the area/results aren't interesting enough to enough people, that they get any scrutiny).
But with computer generated proofs that can't be checked other than by another computer this process breaks down. And that's a problem. Perhaps mainly from a philosophical standpoint (that's why us computer scientists mainly ignore it), but then again, mathematics is philosophy (some say in its purest form), so one shouldn't take that step lightly, and without due consideration.
So, perhaps, in the future, mathematical arguments will all be made by contrarian AI:s, who will make arguments and hold debates that we mere mortals can't even begin to follow, but we're not there yet. Not by a long shot.
Yes. Don't take my argument to mean that I want to throw out the baby with the bathwater. I'm a firm believer in the use of computers in mathematics. I think we're only just scraping the surface of what's possible. (To add to your example: there's interesting work in statistics for example, where Monte Carlo type simulations have demonstrated that certain statistical tests are much more accurate and valuable, compared to others, on a wide range of different data. Results that were very difficult, if not impossible, to achieve with traditional analytical methods).
But as always, one has to beware of the "I have a very large hammer, so everything's starting to look like a nail"-bias. Computers are an invaluable tool for some situations like you say, and maybe not so hot for others, like you also point out.
Of course it's a proof.
Not so fast. There are several mathematicians that don't necessarily agree with that statement. At least not in its strongest form. (We'll ignore the editor basing their argument on the wrong thing, of course being "satisfying" to a human has little bearing on the "proofness" of a mathematical argument).
In fact, whether computer generated proofs that are too large to check by human mathematicians are really proofs at all is a question that's alive (if not exactly well) in the mathematical community, and you'll find many mathematicians who will sneer at it. This based on the realisation that many so called proofs are wrong. The history of computer generated proofs and verifications in particular being littered with incorrect results (often due to a validation problem, rather than a verification problem, but the latter, due to bugs in the verifier are not unheard of). Hence, the need for some form of human verification. They don't call it "the social process of mathematics" for nothing. Like Jim Horning said: "A Proof is a repeatable experiment in persuasion." Now, if you need another computer to verify the first, you soon end up with a "it's computers all the way down-silly"-type of argument, that doesn't make more pure mathematicians feel exactly warm and fuzzy all over. (Us computer scientist we shrug and get on with it, but that's a different story.)
I didn't say it did. I said "IF you live your life scientifically", which in context means "you live your life based on scientific evaluation of every action and choose only that which is the most likely to provide the greatest good to the greatest number of people first, and then to oneself second." Skydiving, evaluated under such criteria, would never happen.
"Greatest good to greatest number of people" is not a scientific posture. It is a moral one based on utilitarian ethics. Science doesn't factor into it and scientism is unpopular for a reason...
And also, who are you to question someone else's utility of sky diving? We accept risk to reap the benefits. I assume that sky divers feel the benefits outweigh the risks.
As many times as that is repeated, it is still not true. Your children are at risk because of their own systems, not because someone in Canada chooses not to have their child vaccinated. If that unvaccinated child got sick, then the disease is still out there and your child can get sick, too, without ever coming anywhere close to them. Life isn't perfect. Children who aren't vaccinated aren't death threats to other people.
No. The whole idea of herd immunity is that when the disease cannot find a viable population, it isn't "out there" anymore. That's how we have been able to eradicate e.g. small pox through vaccination, to the point where we don't need the vaccination anymore. And my children can't get sick through unvaccinated children in Canada, that's not how diseases work. But those children in Canada can keep a disease alive and flourishing, so if you wish a case for their vaccination could still be made. And by your scientist reasoning probably should be, since you believe utilitarianism is all there is.
(**) Tetra ethyl lead, for instance.
No, not really. "Science," as in free and unencumbered science was very sceptical of leaded gasoline from the outset. But industry funded "scientist" were adamant that it was safe. So, it serves as a cautionary tale of caveat emptor, complete with industry lawsuits of independent scientist and not to trust those with a demonstrated vested interest.
(***) Science now says that SSRI's are ineffective, despite being the go-to prescription medication for depression.
Nope, that's wrong to. Why and how SSRIs work is a complex issue, part of a complex problem. While there are one or two studies that do seem to indicate that the proposed mechanisms aren't the whole story, there is a substantial body of work that demonstrates efficiency for a large number of patients. But not all of them, or even a large part of them. So to say that the "science" is settled because of one or two studies is jumping the gun. Those studies are barely out of the starting blocks, while you claim they've won. Science doesn't work that way, esp. not in the biological/medical field. Remember, "one study is no study". And more recent studies aren't necessarily better (or worse) than twenty year old ones. Depression and the biological reasons for it, are much more complex than you give them credit for.
So, most, not to say many, of your examples, including Thiomersal aren't examples of "science" getting it wrong. They're examples, of news reporters, society, and you, getting the science wrong. Not the other way around. And given the general understanding and reporting of scientific matters I can't say I solely blame you.
If people understood the risk of skydiving, for example, and lived their lives "scientifically", nobody would ever skydive.
As an erstwhile rock climber, alpinist, and then and current scientist, I don't even know where to begin...
Science does not in any way shaper or form require you to live a life of risk minimisation. That's a philosophical question, and not one for science. What science can help you with is learning about the risk, and as our sense of risk is really, really bad, that's a good a necessary thing. Science can also help to point out that living is accepting risk. You have to weigh the benefit against the cost in everything you do. I made the decision for myself, that the benefits of climbing outweighed the risks. Others may reasonable make other decisions.
Now of course, that people sky dive, climb, cave dive or whatever, is a complete straw man and not at all analogous with refusing vaccine. I have no problem what so ever with you killing yourself doing what you want to do. So if you want to make a hole in the ground sky diving, be my guest. However, refusing vaccine for yourself doesn't just put yourself at risk, it puts me and esp. my children (who have difficulty getting certain vaccines due to medical reasons) at risk. Science tells me that, and that's something I have a problem with. And that you put your children at risk, who aren't you, that I also have a problem with, but not as great as said children putting my children at risk.
It was discovered that the amount of mistakes on code worked on during those pushes went up dramatically, and especially tellingly - during the last 4 hours of those 14-16 hour days, frequently working all weekend as well for up to 2 months.
And that's why USAF air craft mechanics do not work more than 12 hours per day, even during combat. Their bosses/officers, who will ultimately fly the planes, don't want them falling out of the sky due to simple and unavoidable mistakes. (It's amazing what management with true buy in will do to boost common sense in said management.)
And that's realising that even 12 hours is pushing it. Sixteen? Forget about it.
Pretty much yes.
And it doesn't matter much since "all" workplaces fall under collective agreements, and if you try to run a business without signing that agreement, then you'll be boycotted by all unions (no services performed, no deliveries etc.) and many customers as well.
The odd american company tries to bring their corporate (anti-union) culture over here, but they've all failed spectacularly so far. The last I remember is Toy's R Us, way back when. They folded pretty quickly.
So in Sweden almost anybody could be a member of a union (take for instance the Swedish Officers Union for instance, for officers in the armed forces), but even if they aren't, it doesn't matter as a whole.
Now, of course, with this much power comes great responsibility, so unions are much more well behaved here. In fact strikes etc. are extremely uncommon, too uncommon some would say.