It's not just life sciences. Look at the uproar over printable handguns going on right now. The government's long-running attempts to mitigate the social problem of violence by regulating the supply of firearms is about to evaporate. Pretty soon the government won't be able to accomplish anything by targeting the few dozen gun manufacturers and few thousand retailers across the country, like they do now. Pretty soon any American who can afford a $1,000 printer will be able to make as many handguns as he wants, right at home.
So I guess we'll get to see if the government responds by finally trying to deal with the actual cause of the social problem in question, or if they just go about banning things left and right, in (yet another) hopeless attempt at fixing a social problem by going after a symptom rather than the cause.
I'm guessing they'll just try to regulate or ban the 3D printers.
Because food labelling should be appropriate and helpful. To the end consumer, there is no benefit to knowing whether the food was GMO or not, and such a "warning" would be grossly misleading and would undermine other, more legitimate, labelling that might actually be helpful.
Indeed. Mandatory labelling requirements on food are about letting people know about its nutritional content (e.g., ingredients and the "nutrition facts" box) for people who are on restrictive diets, and warning people about ingredients or aspects that are known to be unsafe for certain people (e.g., allergy warnings). These requirements are based on known, scientific health claims. Someone on a no-cholesterol diet because of a heart attack has to know if there's cholesterol in something. Someone with a nut allergy has to know that the food wasn't processed on a machine that could be contaminated with peanut oil from other products.
There is also regulation as to what companies can optionally print on their packaging for marketing purposes (e.g., claiming a food is "organic"). But this is just about keeping marketing labels honest: The FDA isn't supporting any assertions that "organic" or "chocolate" is a healthier claim than in-organic or mere "chocolate-flavored," they're just making sure that the labels aren't fraudulent.
Allowing producers to slap "organic" on a product, in order to appeal to the crowd that buys such products, is entirely different than requiring a label that says something isn't "organic."
There are no meaningful differences between GM foods and non-GM foods. For the purpose of the ingredients label, it's all "wheat" or "corn" or whatever. GM doesn't cause allergies or any other known negative reactions in people. The only thing that such a label would do is play into the irrational, nearly superstitious fears that many people have against this modern technology. The government may as well mandate printing horoscopes on the labels.
On that basis, perhaps GM crops getting out of control of their creators is a good thing. If they can't control it, they can't realistically argue they "own" it, and hopefully future court decisions would take that into account.
Never underestimate the power of marketing, especially the guilt-based marketing endemic to "green" foods. Someone will start selling insects as food marketing it as good for the environment, an alternative to factory-farmed meat, having a low carbon footprint, or whatever, and environmentally-conscious types will line up to buy them in droves. Some vegetarians will eat animals like fish, one argument being that simpler life forms like fish don't experience pain and suffering like cows and pigs do, so there's probably that market, too.
You're not going to see bugburgers at McDonald's any time soon, but this kind of stuff will be hitting the organic/whole/alternatives foods markets within a few years, I'm sure.
Insecticides, like nearly all poisons, are not fatal at sufficiently low dosages. Poisons are frequently rating with a system called "LD50" which tells you what dosage is lethal for 50% of test subjects exposed to it, e.g., the the LD50 of nicotine is 50 mg/kg for rats, 3 mg/kg for mice, and 30-60 mg/kg for human beings.
And a lot if insecticides will bioaccumulate in human beings (being fat-soluble, rather than water-, they build up in human fat tissues), so if a person eats enough of the insecticide, over time they may end up carrying a harmful or fatal dose of it.
Do those efficiency numbers take everything into account, or is that just the efficiency of the fuel input to energy output?
That is, I'd rather have a 2%-efficient power source that I could just plant in my back yard and forget about, than a 57%-efficient one that I'm constantly buying fuel for, periodically maintaining, and so on. Maybe it'll take half an acre of these "power plants" to give you the same amount of energy as one engine---but if that's half an acre of trees that grow on their own, unassisted, just like natural plants, isn't it more efficient on the whole than a mechanical engine?
The article basically says, when people drive in a completely unnatural manner---accelerating slowly and five miles under the speed limit---they get x miles per gallon. You stated that when you do the same thing, you get the same x miles per gallon. Wow, really?
No one is claiming the EPA is publishing false results. They're claiming the EPA sets unrealistic test criteria to produce their results, and all you did was confirm this.
Eric Schmidt on a disruptive new technology Google has figured out how to profit from: "Schmidt cautioned against jumping to the worst conclusions, saying that society always tends to adapt to new technologies --- and he's hoping for etiquette rather than government regulation."
Eric Schmidt on one they haven't: "Google Chairman Eric Schmidt is urging lawmakers to regulate the use of unmanned aircraft by civilians --- and quickly."
Re:That's the inconvenient truth of "the simple li
on
Iceman Had Bad Teeth
·
· Score: 2, Informative
Forget the article, you didn't even read the whole summary, I see. "The uptick in starches, the researchers suggest, could explain the increasing frequency of cavities in teeth from the time---a problem that's been with us ever since." In other words, tooth decay isn't caused by lack of dentists. It's caused by eating food that isn't the natural diet for human beings. Dentistry is only needed to fix a problem we've caused ourselves.
People didn't only live until 30. That statistic is an average: Infant mortality was high, but if people made it through childhood, they died in their 60s-80s just like they do nowadays. Go look up a few random historical figures from ancient times if you don't believe me. Socrates died in his 70s. Plato made it to 80. Aristotle, 62. Roman Emperor Augustus, 76. Tiberius, 78.
But I suppose these are some of the myths you need to believe in, and propagate, to support "national health coverage." So by all means carry on.
They're "fake" because they're not part of the elitist old regime. They're "fake" because they're competing with the old regime and threatening its hegemony.
See my earlier comment; in many countries these language institutes do indeed have the power to enforce: Using unofficial language in commerce, such as on business signs or advertisements, is often prohibited. They may not be able to tell you what you can say, but if you put unapproved language on a sign, it can be handled like a code violation.
And no, they're not reactive,* they are quite pro-active: That's the entire point of this article, in fact; the Swedish language police refusing to acknowledge a word people are using because it upsets a big corporation. The OED is an example of a reactive lexicographic authority, but these government language police are the opposite.
* This is typically referred to in lexicography as "descriptivist" rather than "proscriptivist" lexicography. Descriptivist lexicographers document the language as used; proscriptivists try to tell you how it's properly used. English has a mix of both schools; proscriptivism was particularly popular during the Victorian era, but no actual government authority was ever placed behind it.
I don't know what the rules are in Sweden, but many countries with official language institutes actually do enforce the official language in some contexts, for example text appearing on business signs, advertisements, &c.. Years ago Dunkin' Donuts was involved in a controversy in a French-speaking country over "Dunkin'" on their signs (that use of an apostrophe isn't legitimate in French apparently). At one point, the French were also enforcing the term cédérom be used for CD-ROMs.
I think the government telling you what day it is, and the government telling you what words are really part of your language, is quite on the same level of absurdity.
So a bunch of countries have language police. Your argument boils down to "waaaah everyone else is doing it!" ?
But let's assume that's a legitimate argument. A bunch of countries also, for example, regulate official weights and measures. What would you think if some major, well-connected corporation pressured the government into redefining the units used for commerce? Maybe Coca-Cola would like to get away with selling 1.8L bottles for the same price they used to sell two litres for but don't want consumers to notice the labelling change, so they pressure the government into defining a "U.S. Litre" as 0.9 metric litres. Now they can print "Net weight: 2.0 (U.S.) L" on the label. Equally absurd?
But I guess that's okay since "lots of countries" regulate weights and measures.
In ancient Rome, there was a government official responsible for determining whether or not this particular year would have a "leap month" (mensis intercalaris), rather than it being based on a mathematical formula as it is nowadays. Naturally, a certain degree of power came with this ability; if a contract or a political office expired later in the year, by inserting (or not inserting) the intercalary month after February, one could effectively extend or cut short the term of those contracts or offices.
And of course, men of power or influence were eventually able to bribe, or coerce, the calendar officials into doing just that for them. Yes, the government actually had the power to tell you what time it was---and, what a surprise, this power was soon corrupted.
Maybe it's time people who speak Swedish start ignoring the Swedish language "police" and their obviously-bought (or coerced) decisions on what makes up the "real" Swedish lexicon.
The law is stupid because the idea that laws serve as an effective deterrent is stupid.
Remember when they passed that law against __________, and now no one does __________ anymore? Hmm? Yeah, neither do I.
If "laser strikes" are now a potential safety hazard, and the government wants to "do something" about them, they should start requiring pilots to wear appropriate safety gear to protect themselves against laser strikes. See my above comment; the proper response to safety hazards is come up with practical solutions that actually mitigate the hazard, not expect that telling people "don't do it" is suddenly going to stop everyone from doing it.
Slashdot Mirror
It's not just life sciences. Look at the uproar over printable handguns going on right now. The government's long-running attempts to mitigate the social problem of violence by regulating the supply of firearms is about to evaporate. Pretty soon the government won't be able to accomplish anything by targeting the few dozen gun manufacturers and few thousand retailers across the country, like they do now. Pretty soon any American who can afford a $1,000 printer will be able to make as many handguns as he wants, right at home.
So I guess we'll get to see if the government responds by finally trying to deal with the actual cause of the social problem in question, or if they just go about banning things left and right, in (yet another) hopeless attempt at fixing a social problem by going after a symptom rather than the cause.
I'm guessing they'll just try to regulate or ban the 3D printers.
Since when does one need evidence to spread fear, uncertainty, and doubt that plays on irrational superstitions about modern technologies?
Indeed. Mandatory labelling requirements on food are about letting people know about its nutritional content (e.g., ingredients and the "nutrition facts" box) for people who are on restrictive diets, and warning people about ingredients or aspects that are known to be unsafe for certain people (e.g., allergy warnings). These requirements are based on known, scientific health claims. Someone on a no-cholesterol diet because of a heart attack has to know if there's cholesterol in something. Someone with a nut allergy has to know that the food wasn't processed on a machine that could be contaminated with peanut oil from other products.
There is also regulation as to what companies can optionally print on their packaging for marketing purposes (e.g., claiming a food is "organic"). But this is just about keeping marketing labels honest: The FDA isn't supporting any assertions that "organic" or "chocolate" is a healthier claim than in-organic or mere "chocolate-flavored," they're just making sure that the labels aren't fraudulent.
Allowing producers to slap "organic" on a product, in order to appeal to the crowd that buys such products, is entirely different than requiring a label that says something isn't "organic."
There are no meaningful differences between GM foods and non-GM foods. For the purpose of the ingredients label, it's all "wheat" or "corn" or whatever. GM doesn't cause allergies or any other known negative reactions in people. The only thing that such a label would do is play into the irrational, nearly superstitious fears that many people have against this modern technology. The government may as well mandate printing horoscopes on the labels.
On that basis, perhaps GM crops getting out of control of their creators is a good thing. If they can't control it, they can't realistically argue they "own" it, and hopefully future court decisions would take that into account.
Then stop putting it in your mouth. You honestly need the government to ban something to stop you from doing this?
Never underestimate the power of marketing, especially the guilt-based marketing endemic to "green" foods. Someone will start selling insects as food marketing it as good for the environment, an alternative to factory-farmed meat, having a low carbon footprint, or whatever, and environmentally-conscious types will line up to buy them in droves. Some vegetarians will eat animals like fish, one argument being that simpler life forms like fish don't experience pain and suffering like cows and pigs do, so there's probably that market, too.
You're not going to see bugburgers at McDonald's any time soon, but this kind of stuff will be hitting the organic/whole/alternatives foods markets within a few years, I'm sure.
Insecticides, like nearly all poisons, are not fatal at sufficiently low dosages. Poisons are frequently rating with a system called "LD50" which tells you what dosage is lethal for 50% of test subjects exposed to it, e.g., the the LD50 of nicotine is 50 mg/kg for rats, 3 mg/kg for mice, and 30-60 mg/kg for human beings.
And a lot if insecticides will bioaccumulate in human beings (being fat-soluble, rather than water-, they build up in human fat tissues), so if a person eats enough of the insecticide, over time they may end up carrying a harmful or fatal dose of it.
We already eat some insects: Skittles and other glazed candies use the lac bug. Red food dye comes from the cochineal scale insect.
Do those efficiency numbers take everything into account, or is that just the efficiency of the fuel input to energy output?
That is, I'd rather have a 2%-efficient power source that I could just plant in my back yard and forget about, than a 57%-efficient one that I'm constantly buying fuel for, periodically maintaining, and so on. Maybe it'll take half an acre of these "power plants" to give you the same amount of energy as one engine---but if that's half an acre of trees that grow on their own, unassisted, just like natural plants, isn't it more efficient on the whole than a mechanical engine?
No, that information would be regulated by the ATF.
And the law you reference violates the First Amendment, so this has everything to do with it.
Here are some mirrors:
http://www.jraxis.com/tmp/DefDist_DEFCAD_MEGA_PACK_v4.2_(Saito).zip
http://www.eprci.net/DefDist_DEFCAD_MEGA_PACK_v4.2_(Saito).zip
https://www.nhteaparty.org/DefDist_DEFCAD_MEGA_PACK_v4.2_(Saito).zip
http://www.manchfreepress.com/sites/default/files/DefDist_DEFCAD_MEGA_PACK_v4.2_(Saito).zip
"Requests" to remove these files will be heartily laughed at.
Here are a few mirrors to wreck the State Department's day:
http://www.jraxis.com/tmp/DefDist_DEFCAD_MEGA_PACK_v4.2_(Saito).zip
http://www.eprci.net/DefDist_DEFCAD_MEGA_PACK_v4.2_(Saito).zip
https://www.nhteaparty.org/DefDist_DEFCAD_MEGA_PACK_v4.2_(Saito).zip
http://www.manchfreepress.com/sites/default/files/DefDist_DEFCAD_MEGA_PACK_v4.2_(Saito).zip
Score 5; insightful?
All the GRBs we see are pointed right at us. They're highly directional; any GRBs that aren't pointed right at us we can't even detect.
The article basically says, when people drive in a completely unnatural manner---accelerating slowly and five miles under the speed limit---they get x miles per gallon. You stated that when you do the same thing, you get the same x miles per gallon. Wow, really?
No one is claiming the EPA is publishing false results. They're claiming the EPA sets unrealistic test criteria to produce their results, and all you did was confirm this.
What a slimy hypocrite.
Eric Schmidt on a disruptive new technology Google has figured out how to profit from: "Schmidt cautioned against jumping to the worst conclusions, saying that society always tends to adapt to new technologies --- and he's hoping for etiquette rather than government regulation."
Eric Schmidt on one they haven't: "Google Chairman Eric Schmidt is urging lawmakers to regulate the use of unmanned aircraft by civilians --- and quickly."
Yup. There's even a name for this: It's called the Washington Monument Syndrome.
Your government at work.
This is called the Washington Monument Syndrome.
Forget the article, you didn't even read the whole summary, I see. "The uptick in starches, the researchers suggest, could explain the increasing frequency of cavities in teeth from the time---a problem that's been with us ever since." In other words, tooth decay isn't caused by lack of dentists. It's caused by eating food that isn't the natural diet for human beings. Dentistry is only needed to fix a problem we've caused ourselves.
People didn't only live until 30. That statistic is an average: Infant mortality was high, but if people made it through childhood, they died in their 60s-80s just like they do nowadays. Go look up a few random historical figures from ancient times if you don't believe me. Socrates died in his 70s. Plato made it to 80. Aristotle, 62. Roman Emperor Augustus, 76. Tiberius, 78.
But I suppose these are some of the myths you need to believe in, and propagate, to support "national health coverage." So by all means carry on.
They're "fake" because they're not part of the elitist old regime. They're "fake" because they're competing with the old regime and threatening its hegemony.
See my earlier comment; in many countries these language institutes do indeed have the power to enforce: Using unofficial language in commerce, such as on business signs or advertisements, is often prohibited. They may not be able to tell you what you can say, but if you put unapproved language on a sign, it can be handled like a code violation.
And no, they're not reactive,* they are quite pro-active: That's the entire point of this article, in fact; the Swedish language police refusing to acknowledge a word people are using because it upsets a big corporation. The OED is an example of a reactive lexicographic authority, but these government language police are the opposite.
* This is typically referred to in lexicography as "descriptivist" rather than "proscriptivist" lexicography. Descriptivist lexicographers document the language as used; proscriptivists try to tell you how it's properly used. English has a mix of both schools; proscriptivism was particularly popular during the Victorian era, but no actual government authority was ever placed behind it.
I don't know what the rules are in Sweden, but many countries with official language institutes actually do enforce the official language in some contexts, for example text appearing on business signs, advertisements, &c.. Years ago Dunkin' Donuts was involved in a controversy in a French-speaking country over "Dunkin'" on their signs (that use of an apostrophe isn't legitimate in French apparently). At one point, the French were also enforcing the term cédérom be used for CD-ROMs.
I think the government telling you what day it is, and the government telling you what words are really part of your language, is quite on the same level of absurdity.
So a bunch of countries have language police. Your argument boils down to "waaaah everyone else is doing it!" ?
But let's assume that's a legitimate argument. A bunch of countries also, for example, regulate official weights and measures. What would you think if some major, well-connected corporation pressured the government into redefining the units used for commerce? Maybe Coca-Cola would like to get away with selling 1.8L bottles for the same price they used to sell two litres for but don't want consumers to notice the labelling change, so they pressure the government into defining a "U.S. Litre" as 0.9 metric litres. Now they can print "Net weight: 2.0 (U.S.) L" on the label. Equally absurd?
But I guess that's okay since "lots of countries" regulate weights and measures.
In ancient Rome, there was a government official responsible for determining whether or not this particular year would have a "leap month" (mensis intercalaris), rather than it being based on a mathematical formula as it is nowadays. Naturally, a certain degree of power came with this ability; if a contract or a political office expired later in the year, by inserting (or not inserting) the intercalary month after February, one could effectively extend or cut short the term of those contracts or offices.
And of course, men of power or influence were eventually able to bribe, or coerce, the calendar officials into doing just that for them. Yes, the government actually had the power to tell you what time it was---and, what a surprise, this power was soon corrupted.
Maybe it's time people who speak Swedish start ignoring the Swedish language "police" and their obviously-bought (or coerced) decisions on what makes up the "real" Swedish lexicon.
The law is stupid because the idea that laws serve as an effective deterrent is stupid.
Remember when they passed that law against __________, and now no one does __________ anymore? Hmm? Yeah, neither do I.
If "laser strikes" are now a potential safety hazard, and the government wants to "do something" about them, they should start requiring pilots to wear appropriate safety gear to protect themselves against laser strikes. See my above comment; the proper response to safety hazards is come up with practical solutions that actually mitigate the hazard, not expect that telling people "don't do it" is suddenly going to stop everyone from doing it.