Nuclear may or may not be part of the energy solution, but it's hardly the whole thing. You don't solve our transportation by sticking uranium up your car's tailpipes.
Reality and sanity says that we need both to look where we're using oil, and find alternative ways to generate and transport energy to those points of use, how we generate energy at all, and whether there are more efficient ways to do the same things.
Anyone who says "Global warming? Let's just go Nuclear!" is, unfortunately, failing to address 90% of the issues. Which is why you'll find those concerned about global warming don't restrict themselves to a single solution.
I dearly want us to stop banning people from living close to the businesses that serve them, as is common in the US. I want to see better use of available infrastructure, such as rail, to provide access to walkable cities from everywhere. I want more fuel efficient vehicles, and I'd like, ultimately, to see lower cost electric vehicles designed to drive the shorter distances that ought to be more common if we rethink planning policies - I don't know about you, but I don't really need a vehicle that goes for more than 50 miles without {long period of downtime due to recharging} 99% of the time, and would be happy to keep a low cost second vehicle around for those times of journey, yet 99% of the expense of electric vehicles right now has to do with the obsession of making them universal replacements for gasoline vehicles - sticking in redundant gasoline motors, or five times the number of batteries.
And here's the other thing that really bothers me: most of those pushing against global warming or insisting on single solutions are insistent that any solution must protect the status quo. The status quo sucks. My energy usage is high not because I want it to be, but because of poor zoning policies, crappy offerings from transportation businesses, and so on.
Even if gas was back to a dollar a gallon as it was under Clinton, I don't _want_ to fucking drive everywhere. Who the hell does? Who enjoys being locked in a metal box for an hour or two a day, having to concentrate on nothing except whether that box is between two lines painted on the tarmac? Who likes the fact they can't really go for a drink after work or, well, easily socialize anyway, because of the requirements and boundaries set by reliance on motor vehicles?
Does everyone actually like the fact their property and sales taxes are high despite the complete lack of the public services, solely because of the costs of maintaining many times the lengths of roads necessary because we've gone out of our way to partition off neighborhoods from businesses? What about the cost of food and other essentials? (Why is it about half the price in Britain than in the US, despite much higher taxes and much lower subsidies in the UK?)
You're looking for a positive message? That's because you're not listening! Put in the basic, obvious, solutions that have been proposed for decades, and there's every reason to believe our lives will be more relaxed, our cost of living cheaper, and our options more free.
Nuclear solves 10% of the problem, and isn't a positive or negative solution, any more than windmills or solar is.
One thing I think's a crying shame is that HBO requires a cable subscription. It would genuinely be nice to subscribe to four or five channels, for a moderate monthly free ($15-25), that provides ad free channels and decent quality shows. Unfortunately, HBO doesn't allow that, and right now only offers a subset (some movies and dramas. No news. Few (any?) documentaries. etc.)
Here's the deal: with Dish Network, you need a home where you're capable of putting up a large ugly disc on the side of a building, or some other prominent place.
Any home of that nature is equally capable of having a large ugly VHF/UHF antenna in the same place.
And since the digital transition, all Dish Network HD DVRs are capable of sucking down an ATSC signal from a regular antenna and recording it. They have built in ATSC tuners, and you can treat an ATSC channel as just another channel to select. And Dish honors the ATSC numbering system too so it's not like cable where channel 5 OTA is channel 173 "Digital cable".
So... essentially if a terrestrial channel doesn't want to play ball with Dish, it's not as big a deal as you might imagine. About the only issue is that ATSC MPEG-2 streams take up rather more DVR space than their compressed H.264 feeds...
I didn't say it's "like ChromeOS", I said it's a browser-based OS. That is, when you boot into it your primary interaction is via a shell written in Javascript and HTML running on a web browser (IE)'s core engine.
There's still a distinct I.E. browser app that you start from Metro.
No, there's a "web app" you can start from Metro called Internet Explorer. It's not "distinct", it's built upon the same core engine. And yes, nothing prevents the Mozilla team from creating a browser that runs under Metro, it's just it's not likely to ever get used given the context.
I assume this bit of sophistry of yours is why some idiot decided to mod my original comment a "troll". I've used Windows 8, I've studied the documentation. I know what I'm talking about. You can get into pointless discussions of nothing by arguing where the boundaries start and end, but the reality is that Metro is running under the IE engine. Metro apps - which is where Microsoft wants you developing in future - ARE built upon core IE technologies. The shell is an HTML/JS environment.
Or in other words, it's a browser based operating system.
Well, you can use a different browser on a ChromeBook. To the best of my knowledge, only "Opera Mini" is acceptable as a non-Webkit based web browser alternative on iOS.
But there are a few things to say here:
First, you're claiming a double standard. What double standard? What Slashbots are you reading that enthuse over the Chromebook anyway (even allowing for the fact it isn't as locked down as you claim)? And I'm hardly a lone voice when *I* criticize Apple on here, regularly, for locking down iOS. You might just as well go into a court and say "Oh, so you're saying I can't murder people. Well what about Charles Manson? Or Ted Bundy? Huh? Huh? DOUBLE STANDARD!!!?!1!"
The second is, quite honestly, I don't care in this instance.
OMG, did I really say that? Why, yes I did! Well, let's walk that back slightly. I think RT sucks for being locked down like iOS, but let's also look at Windows 8 in general, not just RT (which will probably go the same way as its powerful but too-little-too-late IBM namesake in the 1980s.)
Windows 8 is a browser based operating system. This time for real. Not a Windows 98 type "We're sticking the browser in Explorer and pretending this benefits you somehow by letting you create some desktop widgets using it that'll be long forgotten by the time the idea is dusted off again for Mac OS X as an evolution of desk accessories", but "You will be using a complete environment, that you can choose to never leave if you wish, written in Javascript and HTML."
In that context, replacing the browser doesn't make any sense whatsoever. That's like replacing the file system (I don't mean the layout of files on the disk, I mean the library calls to open and close files), or standard C library. All you'd do is introduce incompatibility within your operating system so existing apps no longer work because of something Firefox does that IE doesn't, or something IE does that Firefox doesn't, or both.
The exception, of course, is the desktop. You can escape to the desktop if you wish (and in the early days of Windows 8 you will, probably all the time if you're a gamer or software developer, though not so much if you're grandma.) In that context, the operating system ceases to be accessed via a browser, and installing Firefox makes sense.
Windows RT, of course, heavily deprecates the desktop. And why wouldn't it? It's designed specifically for tablets. Desktops require mice and don't play well with touchscreens. The only reason the desktop is there at all is so that Microsoft doesn't have to come up with Office RT before Windows RT.
With all of this in mind, this is not really as big an issue as you might think. It's less of an issue than it is with iOS, because iOS isn't a browser based OS. Nothing breaks if you install Firefox/Fennec on an iOS device. The user experience isn't damaged in any way. Users expect to use an app to access the Internet. Users, therefore, reasonably expect to be able to choose between different apps for that particular function. In RT, you're already connected to the world wide web. From the start. When you boot up. Your launch screen is a bunch of RSS feeds and other widgets written in HTML and JS. You're on the 'net.
In a way it's sad the ISA standard is gone; it was very easy for an electronic geek to make ISA cards as the protocol didn't require complicated hardware.
I don't think modern computers have any interface left that can be used without requiring a chip to handle the protocol.
You could probably use the sound card FWIW.
That said, if it's a choice between a machine ultimately restricted to a few MHz in performance for a significant amount of its internal communications, or one that requires a chip costing a few dollars per DIY project, is it really a step back to have the latter?...
Why wouldn't you get a raise in line with inflation? The economic climate isn't tied to the value of the dollar.
In fact, the downfall of the first wave of Keynesianism was due to precisely this: in the early seventies, a variety of problem with the economy (notably the oil crisis) caused inflation to rocket. Rather than coming back down when unemployment started to take grow, as Keynes predicted, it continued steadily upwards. Why? Because wages were still rising. Why were they rising? Because people wouldn't take jobs unless they paid enough to live on; and because those with jobs weren't going to accept a pay cut in real terms. And these two, combined with the pre-existing inflation, caused salaries to be negotiated as if inflation was inevitable.
Result? A switch to Monetarism, and relatively mediocre growtih since 1975 compared to that we were getting from 1945-1970 because nobody wanted to give that Keynesian thing another chance.
We've just had a massive spurt of deflation, largely localized around one market (housing.) The imbalance between assets and debt this has caused has resulted in economic disaster, banks collapsing in record numbers, industries suffering for lack of customers - both those who are now penniless and those who are still paying massive mortgages without a raise - and sometimes working a job that pays less.
The only way out right now is to inflate. Unfortunately, the vested interests against inflation are the people with money, and money is power. So it's not happening, and it's difficult to see how things can improve until something snaps.
If I were referencing a story about whether conservatives are distrustful of science, I would be asking why conservatives are distrustful of science.
However, as you can see, not only do I make no such reference, but I ask why there's a concerted campaign to make conservatives distrustful of science, in an article about one organization that's mounting a concerted campaign to make conservatives distrustful of science.
The question "Is it working" would be interesting if it wasn't already obvious - conservatives are, far and away, more likely to use words like "hoax" against actual science (as in peer review, studies, hypotheses, testing hypotheses, development of theories from tested hypotheses, etc), and I'm not merely talking about Presidential candidates like Santorum, but also about otherwise smart and open minded friends of mine who, for their own bizarre reasons, self identify as conservatives, and vote Republican.
But that's not the question. The question is why so much money is being funneled into groups like Cato, The Heartland Institute, and others in a deliberate attempt to make conservatives distrustful of science? Why is there not just as much time and effort and money being spent in making liberals distrustful of science?
And why do conservatives just accept it, rather than treat it as the insult it is and fight back?
appealing to the authority of science, even when there is no actual evidence supporting it.
Science done in the absence of evidence. An interesting concept.
In the late 60s, some liberals realized that science was well respected by most people and if you cloaked your argument as "science", people would accept it without looking any further. Conservatives started to realize that "science" was being used to promote agendas rather than agendas being derived from science.
Yeah, but we're actually talking about science here, not things people have labeled science. As in collecting evidence, creating a hypothesis or two, testing the hypothesis, developing these into theories, and all within a framework of peer review. So I'm not sure what some marketing campaigns really have to do with this.
the policies that the AGW proponents say that we need to implement to fight AGW are the same policies that they said we needed to avoid mass starvation/prevent the hole in the ozone layer from getting too big/prevent some other cataclysmic disaster.
Uhm. Hokay.
AGW proponents don't seem to be saying much except maybe we should cut down on our oil usage a bit and see whether less energy usage, or development of better energy sources, might help.
Ozone layer - you're not seriously arguing that was part of a liberal 1960s conspiracy now are you? Funny thing: I once read an article by Isaac Asimov in the 1970s describing exactly the problem with CFCs, how they were originally a miracle invention, and how people were starting to learn that they had a habit of breaking down ozone molecules when exposed to direct sunlight.
Anyhoo... the people who were concerned about CFCs were saying we should develop alternatives to CFCs and use them to power our fridges and aerosoles. Which is what happened.
Starvation. Now, that's that thing where we give money to Oxfam right? Pretty sure the solutions advocated by virtually everyone concerned about mass starvation have to do with ending unnecessary wars in the third world, cancelling third world debt, and funding essential infrastructure, together with a few other political tweaks to deal with locally specific issues.
Now, help me out here, but maybe I'm missing something, but how are any of these like any of these? I mean, how is cutting down on fossil fuel usage and using less energy like replacing CFCs with safer alternatives, or cancelling third world debts?
I just don't see it.
Now, maybe you can find some obscure sixties hippy who said something like "Maaan, we can, like, fix the ozone layer, and solve mass starvation, and maybe keep weather patterns under control, by, like, smoking more weed, listening to Jerry Garcia, and implementing a nation wide health care service that's free at the point of delivery", but I can assure you, that guy aint typical.
I can think of a very obvious case where shutting down a cellphone would save lives: when, if the bastard answers the fucking thing one more time, I'm going to climb over the three rows of cinema seats in front of me and beat him to death with it.
Well, that depends on the government official now doesn't it!
Look at Verizon's wording again:
"In such cases, wireless carriers need a process for ensuring that the decision to shut down the network has been appropriately vetted and that the request comes from a single, reliable source."
Pre-911, that wording meant one thing and ONE THING only. A judge.
Treat this as a response to everyone who responded to my OP with a "Conservatives are stupid because they're religious and shit" thing:
No, that's not an answer, because it's not true.
My circle of friends includes many conservatives. The majority are smart, well educated, individuals, and actually, come to think of it, none of my conservative friends, excluding those met via family, offline are actually religious.
And yes, they'll argue till their blue in the face that AGW is a ridiculous liberal myth and they'll only nominally give some credit to the concept that tobacco causes cancer (in particular, the second hand smoke thing they'll treat as a complete myth.)
They are precisely the people targeted by groups like Heartland. They're not idiots. They like to think of themselves as free thinkers. But, nonetheless, relentless anti-AGW propaganda has left them thinking AGW is a giant conspiracy, despite the utter obvious absurdity of such a position.
Curious to know what well funded entities are paying money to people to have them make up stuff that would encourage people to want "Big Government".
One thing I'd like to know is this: for the last few decades there's been a concerted campaign to make conservatives distrustful of science. I don't mean conservatives are (although the fact most of the ones I know insist that AGW is a hoax is a problem), I mean that there are hundreds of millions of dollars being funneled into groups like The Heartland Institute and Cato specifically because however non-partisan they claim to be, they do, ultimately, aim their messages at the Republican party and conservatives in general.
We've seen this on AGW, on tobacco's links to cancer, on asbestos, to a certain extent on evolution (though that's explainable from the conservative church groups), and I'm beginning to wonder if the minor flare up we've seen recently about vaccines isn't going to grow into another example, though there's no evidence they're targeting any political group yet.
So here's what I want to know:
1. Why? Why target conservatives specifically with anti-science propaganda? Why aren't liberals being targeted too? (Arguments like "Conservatives are more gullible" will be ignored for obvious reasons.)
2. Why is there no backlash from conservatives themselves? How many conservatives actually want to (a) be subject to anti-science propaganda that will, inevitably, result - thanks to the wonder of echo chambers - in believing something that's wrong and (b) want to be in a group that will inevitably be considered anti-science?
A "leftist" media would have laughed her stupid ass right off the airwaves after her first Katie Couric interview, when she asked hard-hitting questions like "What do you read?"
Correction: A skeptical, truth-driven, media would have laughed her stupid ass right off the airwaves after her first Katie Couric interview, when she asked hard-hitting questions like "What do you read?"
You didn't have to be left wing to see the problem with Palin. Hell, I personally know people who voted Obama who have voted Republican their entire lives, and frequently come up with racist comments about black neighbors specifically because they were concerned about Palin. Yet the media took her seriously, and, as is depressingly usual, the only serious criticism we saw on television was the comedian set.
Palin, together with the "Torture is not a story", the lack of skepticism when entering Afghanistan and Iraq, the constant smears against the 2001/2005 administration's critics as "unserious" Bush haters, the siding with the right on the "deficit" vs "unemployment" debate, not to mention five years of Clinton's Penis, are all evidence that the bulk of media in the US is far right. The only reason why conservatives don't see that is because they refuse to watch it, preferring to watch Fox News, which tells them, over and over and over and over again, that the media is far left.
I'm fine with it. If everyone knows that the biggest voices against the AGW consensus are so out of arguments that this is what some of them are having to resort to, I think both the Heartland Institute and those who've reported on them are doing the world a favor.
No it doesn't That's a "Ridiculous Liberal Myth" - (ho ho! Did you see what I did there?)
The word liberal, for example, in the UK is generally synonymous with "Guardian Reader", meaning "Someone left of center, cares about those less fortunate than themselves, believes in social justice, wants a government that's soft and cuddly rather than hard and spiky" (OK, that last bit is a little awkward, but the point is... well, "National Health Service? Yay! Death Penalty, wars, and torture? Boo!" sums it up.)
I wouldn't say it's the same thing as the US definition, because people who describe themselves as liberals in the US tend to be way to the right of people who describe themselves as liberals in the UK.
What you're confusing is how liberal is used in context. Liberal economics for instance, is a generally libertarian school of thought. You'll find non-English speaking people using the L word to describe those economics, but they're not talking politics when they do.
This isn't to deny that the term liberal has different definitions in different countries, but to suggest it's "In the US - left of extreme right; in the rest of the world - libertarianism" is, well, just wrong. It's an over-generalization that's most obviously wrong when applied to the birthplace of the English language.
Now, socialism on the other hand - America is the only country I know of that defines socialism as "Anything the government does that I don't like" rather than "A moral philosophy based upon the idea of people working together, for the common good, rather than in competition with one another." The fact that some Americans actually understand both definitions simultaneously and end up saying things like "Open source?! That's SOCIALISM! Do you really want the GOVERNMENT to control all programming?!" is, well, more difficult to understand.
Disagree. Python is a great language, but it's unlike the vast majority of other languages out there. It wouldn't establish you with a base of "How things currently work". You can easily learn Python after learning one of a list of other languages, but other languages are going to come across as a tad confusing if you learn just this one.
I'd go with Javascript. STOP. READ THE FOLLOWING BEFORE FLAMING.
Javascript exactly at the intersection of everything right now. It's a scripting language that's close enough in concept to C# or Java for a jump to be relatively easy. It's enormously powerful, and has 95% of modern programming language features.
Now, TO BE CLEAR (shouting again, because I know you're going to flame me if I don't!) it's NOT that I'd recommend programming in Javascript in anger, it's more that if you jump from JS to Java, C#, Python, or PHP, you're going to find it an easier jump. Jumping from Python to, say, Java is rather more of a leap.
For learning purposes, JS is a great language. Python is also a great language, but don't allow your enthusiasm to get the better of you when promoting it. For learning how the world works today, recommending Python would be as sensible as arguing that a Chinaman who wants to talk to Westerners should learn Italian first.
(Yes, Italian's my favorite spoken language, I'd still recommend English to said Chinese person. Good combination of Romance and Germanic languages that'll get you understanding "us", even if it sucks!)
Yeah, damned those illegal immigrants. I'm sure they're all massing at the borders now, thinking to themselves "As soon as I hop the fence, I'm going to get some pissy farm, construction, or restaurant job, send the money home, and then I'm going to vote in the US presidential election by finding out the name of a registered voter and saying I'm them! Haha!"
WTF?
As I said above, as an ex-Brit, I find the notion photo-ID should be needed to vote utterly absurd. You're doing it wrong.
I lived in Britain for the first 25 years of my life, and I never needed photo ID to vote. Despite that, there was never any suggestion, scandal, or otherwise, that the UK voting system was subject to rampant voter fraud.
May I suggest that if you think photo ID is the solution, you're doing it wrong to begin with?
Pretty much all of them with the kinda-sorta exception of MSNBC, which pretends to be liberal but nobody - left or right - takes remotely seriously anyway.
Sorry dude, but the whole "The media is liberal" whine became more or less ridiculous during the 1990s All Clinton's Penis All The Time stuff, followed by sixish years of "How Dare Your Critificate Our Glorious Leader President Bush", until Katrina when even some Fox News journalists started to find it difficult to carry on pretending the man was anything other than utterly incompetent.
The only reason you think CNN et al are "liberal" are because you watch a network that insists the rest of the networks are "liberal" and that it, somehow, is the exception. C'mon, you're still pretending Obama is most liberal president in history, despite the fact he's continued virtually all the far right policies of the last guy, has a cabinet with a large number of Republicans in it, refused to support any Health Care Reform proposal unless it originated with the Republicans themselves, has done none of the things you pretended he'd do when he got into office, and has a consistent record of refusing to do the right thing if he thinks the Tea Party will throw a fit with one or two tiny, insignificant, exceptions (oh wow, he caught up with the rest of the country and allowed gay people to serve their country. Whoopie doo.)
Realistically, the closest thing liberals have to a voice in the media right now, with the exception of the "I know they're telling me what I want to hear solely for marketing reasons" MSNBC crap, is a fucking comedian. Great. That's our voice in the media. A clown.
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Nuclear may or may not be part of the energy solution, but it's hardly the whole thing. You don't solve our transportation by sticking uranium up your car's tailpipes.
Reality and sanity says that we need both to look where we're using oil, and find alternative ways to generate and transport energy to those points of use, how we generate energy at all, and whether there are more efficient ways to do the same things.
Anyone who says "Global warming? Let's just go Nuclear!" is, unfortunately, failing to address 90% of the issues. Which is why you'll find those concerned about global warming don't restrict themselves to a single solution.
I dearly want us to stop banning people from living close to the businesses that serve them, as is common in the US. I want to see better use of available infrastructure, such as rail, to provide access to walkable cities from everywhere. I want more fuel efficient vehicles, and I'd like, ultimately, to see lower cost electric vehicles designed to drive the shorter distances that ought to be more common if we rethink planning policies - I don't know about you, but I don't really need a vehicle that goes for more than 50 miles without {long period of downtime due to recharging} 99% of the time, and would be happy to keep a low cost second vehicle around for those times of journey, yet 99% of the expense of electric vehicles right now has to do with the obsession of making them universal replacements for gasoline vehicles - sticking in redundant gasoline motors, or five times the number of batteries.
And here's the other thing that really bothers me: most of those pushing against global warming or insisting on single solutions are insistent that any solution must protect the status quo. The status quo sucks. My energy usage is high not because I want it to be, but because of poor zoning policies, crappy offerings from transportation businesses, and so on.
Even if gas was back to a dollar a gallon as it was under Clinton, I don't _want_ to fucking drive everywhere. Who the hell does? Who enjoys being locked in a metal box for an hour or two a day, having to concentrate on nothing except whether that box is between two lines painted on the tarmac? Who likes the fact they can't really go for a drink after work or, well, easily socialize anyway, because of the requirements and boundaries set by reliance on motor vehicles?
Does everyone actually like the fact their property and sales taxes are high despite the complete lack of the public services, solely because of the costs of maintaining many times the lengths of roads necessary because we've gone out of our way to partition off neighborhoods from businesses? What about the cost of food and other essentials? (Why is it about half the price in Britain than in the US, despite much higher taxes and much lower subsidies in the UK?)
You're looking for a positive message? That's because you're not listening! Put in the basic, obvious, solutions that have been proposed for decades, and there's every reason to believe our lives will be more relaxed, our cost of living cheaper, and our options more free.
Nuclear solves 10% of the problem, and isn't a positive or negative solution, any more than windmills or solar is.
One thing I think's a crying shame is that HBO requires a cable subscription. It would genuinely be nice to subscribe to four or five channels, for a moderate monthly free ($15-25), that provides ad free channels and decent quality shows. Unfortunately, HBO doesn't allow that, and right now only offers a subset (some movies and dramas. No news. Few (any?) documentaries. etc.)
You might think that, but you're only looking at one option.
His real secret? Sugar free mints. And bran muffins.
It's 100% empty.
Here's the deal: with Dish Network, you need a home where you're capable of putting up a large ugly disc on the side of a building, or some other prominent place.
Any home of that nature is equally capable of having a large ugly VHF/UHF antenna in the same place.
And since the digital transition, all Dish Network HD DVRs are capable of sucking down an ATSC signal from a regular antenna and recording it. They have built in ATSC tuners, and you can treat an ATSC channel as just another channel to select. And Dish honors the ATSC numbering system too so it's not like cable where channel 5 OTA is channel 173 "Digital cable".
So... essentially if a terrestrial channel doesn't want to play ball with Dish, it's not as big a deal as you might imagine. About the only issue is that ATSC MPEG-2 streams take up rather more DVR space than their compressed H.264 feeds...
I didn't say it's "like ChromeOS", I said it's a browser-based OS. That is, when you boot into it your primary interaction is via a shell written in Javascript and HTML running on a web browser (IE)'s core engine.
No, there's a "web app" you can start from Metro called Internet Explorer. It's not "distinct", it's built upon the same core engine. And yes, nothing prevents the Mozilla team from creating a browser that runs under Metro, it's just it's not likely to ever get used given the context.
I assume this bit of sophistry of yours is why some idiot decided to mod my original comment a "troll". I've used Windows 8, I've studied the documentation. I know what I'm talking about. You can get into pointless discussions of nothing by arguing where the boundaries start and end, but the reality is that Metro is running under the IE engine. Metro apps - which is where Microsoft wants you developing in future - ARE built upon core IE technologies. The shell is an HTML/JS environment.
Or in other words, it's a browser based operating system.
Well, you can use a different browser on a ChromeBook. To the best of my knowledge, only "Opera Mini" is acceptable as a non-Webkit based web browser alternative on iOS.
But there are a few things to say here:
First, you're claiming a double standard. What double standard? What Slashbots are you reading that enthuse over the Chromebook anyway (even allowing for the fact it isn't as locked down as you claim)? And I'm hardly a lone voice when *I* criticize Apple on here, regularly, for locking down iOS. You might just as well go into a court and say "Oh, so you're saying I can't murder people. Well what about Charles Manson? Or Ted Bundy? Huh? Huh? DOUBLE STANDARD!!!?!1!"
The second is, quite honestly, I don't care in this instance.
OMG, did I really say that? Why, yes I did! Well, let's walk that back slightly. I think RT sucks for being locked down like iOS, but let's also look at Windows 8 in general, not just RT (which will probably go the same way as its powerful but too-little-too-late IBM namesake in the 1980s.)
Windows 8 is a browser based operating system. This time for real. Not a Windows 98 type "We're sticking the browser in Explorer and pretending this benefits you somehow by letting you create some desktop widgets using it that'll be long forgotten by the time the idea is dusted off again for Mac OS X as an evolution of desk accessories", but "You will be using a complete environment, that you can choose to never leave if you wish, written in Javascript and HTML."
In that context, replacing the browser doesn't make any sense whatsoever. That's like replacing the file system (I don't mean the layout of files on the disk, I mean the library calls to open and close files), or standard C library. All you'd do is introduce incompatibility within your operating system so existing apps no longer work because of something Firefox does that IE doesn't, or something IE does that Firefox doesn't, or both.
The exception, of course, is the desktop. You can escape to the desktop if you wish (and in the early days of Windows 8 you will, probably all the time if you're a gamer or software developer, though not so much if you're grandma.) In that context, the operating system ceases to be accessed via a browser, and installing Firefox makes sense.
Windows RT, of course, heavily deprecates the desktop. And why wouldn't it? It's designed specifically for tablets. Desktops require mice and don't play well with touchscreens. The only reason the desktop is there at all is so that Microsoft doesn't have to come up with Office RT before Windows RT.
With all of this in mind, this is not really as big an issue as you might think. It's less of an issue than it is with iOS, because iOS isn't a browser based OS. Nothing breaks if you install Firefox/Fennec on an iOS device. The user experience isn't damaged in any way. Users expect to use an app to access the Internet. Users, therefore, reasonably expect to be able to choose between different apps for that particular function. In RT, you're already connected to the world wide web. From the start. When you boot up. Your launch screen is a bunch of RSS feeds and other widgets written in HTML and JS. You're on the 'net.
See the difference?
You could probably use the sound card FWIW.
That said, if it's a choice between a machine ultimately restricted to a few MHz in performance for a significant amount of its internal communications, or one that requires a chip costing a few dollars per DIY project, is it really a step back to have the latter?...
Why wouldn't you get a raise in line with inflation? The economic climate isn't tied to the value of the dollar.
In fact, the downfall of the first wave of Keynesianism was due to precisely this: in the early seventies, a variety of problem with the economy (notably the oil crisis) caused inflation to rocket. Rather than coming back down when unemployment started to take grow, as Keynes predicted, it continued steadily upwards. Why? Because wages were still rising. Why were they rising? Because people wouldn't take jobs unless they paid enough to live on; and because those with jobs weren't going to accept a pay cut in real terms. And these two, combined with the pre-existing inflation, caused salaries to be negotiated as if inflation was inevitable.
Result? A switch to Monetarism, and relatively mediocre growtih since 1975 compared to that we were getting from 1945-1970 because nobody wanted to give that Keynesian thing another chance.
We've just had a massive spurt of deflation, largely localized around one market (housing.) The imbalance between assets and debt this has caused has resulted in economic disaster, banks collapsing in record numbers, industries suffering for lack of customers - both those who are now penniless and those who are still paying massive mortgages without a raise - and sometimes working a job that pays less.
The only way out right now is to inflate. Unfortunately, the vested interests against inflation are the people with money, and money is power. So it's not happening, and it's difficult to see how things can improve until something snaps.
If I were referencing a story about whether conservatives are distrustful of science, I would be asking why conservatives are distrustful of science.
However, as you can see, not only do I make no such reference, but I ask why there's a concerted campaign to make conservatives distrustful of science, in an article about one organization that's mounting a concerted campaign to make conservatives distrustful of science.
The question "Is it working" would be interesting if it wasn't already obvious - conservatives are, far and away, more likely to use words like "hoax" against actual science (as in peer review, studies, hypotheses, testing hypotheses, development of theories from tested hypotheses, etc), and I'm not merely talking about Presidential candidates like Santorum, but also about otherwise smart and open minded friends of mine who, for their own bizarre reasons, self identify as conservatives, and vote Republican.
But that's not the question. The question is why so much money is being funneled into groups like Cato, The Heartland Institute, and others in a deliberate attempt to make conservatives distrustful of science? Why is there not just as much time and effort and money being spent in making liberals distrustful of science?
And why do conservatives just accept it, rather than treat it as the insult it is and fight back?
Science done in the absence of evidence. An interesting concept.
Yeah, but we're actually talking about science here, not things people have labeled science. As in collecting evidence, creating a hypothesis or two, testing the hypothesis, developing these into theories, and all within a framework of peer review. So I'm not sure what some marketing campaigns really have to do with this.
Uhm. Hokay.
AGW proponents don't seem to be saying much except maybe we should cut down on our oil usage a bit and see whether less energy usage, or development of better energy sources, might help.
Ozone layer - you're not seriously arguing that was part of a liberal 1960s conspiracy now are you? Funny thing: I once read an article by Isaac Asimov in the 1970s describing exactly the problem with CFCs, how they were originally a miracle invention, and how people were starting to learn that they had a habit of breaking down ozone molecules when exposed to direct sunlight.
Anyhoo... the people who were concerned about CFCs were saying we should develop alternatives to CFCs and use them to power our fridges and aerosoles. Which is what happened.
Starvation. Now, that's that thing where we give money to Oxfam right? Pretty sure the solutions advocated by virtually everyone concerned about mass starvation have to do with ending unnecessary wars in the third world, cancelling third world debt, and funding essential infrastructure, together with a few other political tweaks to deal with locally specific issues.
Now, help me out here, but maybe I'm missing something, but how are any of these like any of these? I mean, how is cutting down on fossil fuel usage and using less energy like replacing CFCs with safer alternatives, or cancelling third world debts?
I just don't see it.
Now, maybe you can find some obscure sixties hippy who said something like "Maaan, we can, like, fix the ozone layer, and solve mass starvation, and maybe keep weather patterns under control, by, like, smoking more weed, listening to Jerry Garcia, and implementing a nation wide health care service that's free at the point of delivery", but I can assure you, that guy aint typical.
Option 2: Use Google and search for "Boobies"? I hear that Internet thing has a lot of that going on...
I can think of a very obvious case where shutting down a cellphone would save lives: when, if the bastard answers the fucking thing one more time, I'm going to climb over the three rows of cinema seats in front of me and beat him to death with it.
Well, that depends on the government official now doesn't it!
Look at Verizon's wording again:
Pre-911, that wording meant one thing and ONE THING only. A judge.
Treat this as a response to everyone who responded to my OP with a "Conservatives are stupid because they're religious and shit" thing:
No, that's not an answer, because it's not true.
My circle of friends includes many conservatives. The majority are smart, well educated, individuals, and actually, come to think of it, none of my conservative friends, excluding those met via family, offline are actually religious.
And yes, they'll argue till their blue in the face that AGW is a ridiculous liberal myth and they'll only nominally give some credit to the concept that tobacco causes cancer (in particular, the second hand smoke thing they'll treat as a complete myth.)
They are precisely the people targeted by groups like Heartland. They're not idiots. They like to think of themselves as free thinkers. But, nonetheless, relentless anti-AGW propaganda has left them thinking AGW is a giant conspiracy, despite the utter obvious absurdity of such a position.
What gives?
It's OK, I was referring to a man made out of porcelain. Totally different.
Curious to know what well funded entities are paying money to people to have them make up stuff that would encourage people to want "Big Government".
One thing I'd like to know is this: for the last few decades there's been a concerted campaign to make conservatives distrustful of science. I don't mean conservatives are (although the fact most of the ones I know insist that AGW is a hoax is a problem), I mean that there are hundreds of millions of dollars being funneled into groups like The Heartland Institute and Cato specifically because however non-partisan they claim to be, they do, ultimately, aim their messages at the Republican party and conservatives in general.
We've seen this on AGW, on tobacco's links to cancer, on asbestos, to a certain extent on evolution (though that's explainable from the conservative church groups), and I'm beginning to wonder if the minor flare up we've seen recently about vaccines isn't going to grow into another example, though there's no evidence they're targeting any political group yet.
So here's what I want to know:
1. Why? Why target conservatives specifically with anti-science propaganda? Why aren't liberals being targeted too? (Arguments like "Conservatives are more gullible" will be ignored for obvious reasons.)
2. Why is there no backlash from conservatives themselves? How many conservatives actually want to (a) be subject to anti-science propaganda that will, inevitably, result - thanks to the wonder of echo chambers - in believing something that's wrong and (b) want to be in a group that will inevitably be considered anti-science?
What gives?
Correction: A skeptical, truth-driven, media would have laughed her stupid ass right off the airwaves after her first Katie Couric interview, when she asked hard-hitting questions like "What do you read?"
You didn't have to be left wing to see the problem with Palin. Hell, I personally know people who voted Obama who have voted Republican their entire lives, and frequently come up with racist comments about black neighbors specifically because they were concerned about Palin. Yet the media took her seriously, and, as is depressingly usual, the only serious criticism we saw on television was the comedian set.
Palin, together with the "Torture is not a story", the lack of skepticism when entering Afghanistan and Iraq, the constant smears against the 2001/2005 administration's critics as "unserious" Bush haters, the siding with the right on the "deficit" vs "unemployment" debate, not to mention five years of Clinton's Penis, are all evidence that the bulk of media in the US is far right. The only reason why conservatives don't see that is because they refuse to watch it, preferring to watch Fox News, which tells them, over and over and over and over again, that the media is far left.
I'm fine with it. If everyone knows that the biggest voices against the AGW consensus are so out of arguments that this is what some of them are having to resort to, I think both the Heartland Institute and those who've reported on them are doing the world a favor.
No it doesn't That's a "Ridiculous Liberal Myth" - (ho ho! Did you see what I did there?)
The word liberal, for example, in the UK is generally synonymous with "Guardian Reader", meaning "Someone left of center, cares about those less fortunate than themselves, believes in social justice, wants a government that's soft and cuddly rather than hard and spiky" (OK, that last bit is a little awkward, but the point is... well, "National Health Service? Yay! Death Penalty, wars, and torture? Boo!" sums it up.)
I wouldn't say it's the same thing as the US definition, because people who describe themselves as liberals in the US tend to be way to the right of people who describe themselves as liberals in the UK.
What you're confusing is how liberal is used in context. Liberal economics for instance, is a generally libertarian school of thought. You'll find non-English speaking people using the L word to describe those economics, but they're not talking politics when they do.
This isn't to deny that the term liberal has different definitions in different countries, but to suggest it's "In the US - left of extreme right; in the rest of the world - libertarianism" is, well, just wrong. It's an over-generalization that's most obviously wrong when applied to the birthplace of the English language.
Now, socialism on the other hand - America is the only country I know of that defines socialism as "Anything the government does that I don't like" rather than "A moral philosophy based upon the idea of people working together, for the common good, rather than in competition with one another." The fact that some Americans actually understand both definitions simultaneously and end up saying things like "Open source?! That's SOCIALISM! Do you really want the GOVERNMENT to control all programming?!" is, well, more difficult to understand.
IIRC the British equivalent is Norfolk.
Origin of the term "Normal for Norfolk", look it up ;-)
Really? A "Chinese" is a man made out of porcelain (which was CLEARLY what I meant)? ;-)
Disagree. Python is a great language, but it's unlike the vast majority of other languages out there. It wouldn't establish you with a base of "How things currently work". You can easily learn Python after learning one of a list of other languages, but other languages are going to come across as a tad confusing if you learn just this one.
I'd go with Javascript. STOP. READ THE FOLLOWING BEFORE FLAMING.
Javascript exactly at the intersection of everything right now. It's a scripting language that's close enough in concept to C# or Java for a jump to be relatively easy. It's enormously powerful, and has 95% of modern programming language features.
Now, TO BE CLEAR (shouting again, because I know you're going to flame me if I don't!) it's NOT that I'd recommend programming in Javascript in anger, it's more that if you jump from JS to Java, C#, Python, or PHP, you're going to find it an easier jump. Jumping from Python to, say, Java is rather more of a leap.
For learning purposes, JS is a great language. Python is also a great language, but don't allow your enthusiasm to get the better of you when promoting it. For learning how the world works today, recommending Python would be as sensible as arguing that a Chinaman who wants to talk to Westerners should learn Italian first.
(Yes, Italian's my favorite spoken language, I'd still recommend English to said Chinese person. Good combination of Romance and Germanic languages that'll get you understanding "us", even if it sucks!)
Yeah, damned those illegal immigrants. I'm sure they're all massing at the borders now, thinking to themselves "As soon as I hop the fence, I'm going to get some pissy farm, construction, or restaurant job, send the money home, and then I'm going to vote in the US presidential election by finding out the name of a registered voter and saying I'm them! Haha!"
WTF?
As I said above, as an ex-Brit, I find the notion photo-ID should be needed to vote utterly absurd. You're doing it wrong.
I lived in Britain for the first 25 years of my life, and I never needed photo ID to vote. Despite that, there was never any suggestion, scandal, or otherwise, that the UK voting system was subject to rampant voter fraud.
May I suggest that if you think photo ID is the solution, you're doing it wrong to begin with?
Pretty much all of them with the kinda-sorta exception of MSNBC, which pretends to be liberal but nobody - left or right - takes remotely seriously anyway.
Sorry dude, but the whole "The media is liberal" whine became more or less ridiculous during the 1990s All Clinton's Penis All The Time stuff, followed by sixish years of "How Dare Your Critificate Our Glorious Leader President Bush", until Katrina when even some Fox News journalists started to find it difficult to carry on pretending the man was anything other than utterly incompetent.
The only reason you think CNN et al are "liberal" are because you watch a network that insists the rest of the networks are "liberal" and that it, somehow, is the exception. C'mon, you're still pretending Obama is most liberal president in history, despite the fact he's continued virtually all the far right policies of the last guy, has a cabinet with a large number of Republicans in it, refused to support any Health Care Reform proposal unless it originated with the Republicans themselves, has done none of the things you pretended he'd do when he got into office, and has a consistent record of refusing to do the right thing if he thinks the Tea Party will throw a fit with one or two tiny, insignificant, exceptions (oh wow, he caught up with the rest of the country and allowed gay people to serve their country. Whoopie doo.)
Realistically, the closest thing liberals have to a voice in the media right now, with the exception of the "I know they're telling me what I want to hear solely for marketing reasons" MSNBC crap, is a fucking comedian. Great. That's our voice in the media. A clown.
But, hey, carry on whining.