I know someone who had an abortion following testing that showed the child would be viable, but would have various gross abnormalities that precluded a normal life. Her reasoning, and I agree with her, is that this child would have NO quality of life, and she could not do that to a child. So she terminated it and tried again, and this time got a healthy, normal, and most of all HAPPY child, who is not saddled lifelong (however long that may be) with being unable to live in a reasonably normal manner.
But a lot of people seem to take it as personal affront -- how dare you suggest that I have defective genes!! even tho they know, intellectually, that they're condemning their defective child to life of misery merely by bringing it into the world at all.
I recall how some deaf parents threw a fit when it became possible for their deaf children to have near-normal hearing. They refused to do what was needed, because they felt that letting their children become hearing was a condemnation of the parents' own deaf status. (Something similar happened when hormone therapy made it possible for children of dwarf parents to grow to normal status. Some parents refused, on the grounds that making the kid grow up to be normal condemned the PARENTS as abnormal.)
Boils down to parents seeing the child as an extension of themselves, rather than as an independent person with its own life.
Now, as to the nominal topic, I think TFA has a good point -- there are people who behave aggressively, or passive-aggressive, because they fail to distinguish where "I" ends and where "shared" begins. No reason they'd be any better about it in their car, and people who piss on your leg to show their dominance are just as likely to mark their territory in other ways too.
Back to our side discussion, parents who set their kids up to fail (dress them badly so they stand out as outsiders, etc.) are often being territorial in the same way -- MY kid, MY tribe, not allowed to mingle with YOUR tribe, DON'T TOUCH MY STUFF. The kid is an extension of their personal territory.
Heh... that's like what I observed in Los Angeles, before downtown got renovated and became a subset of the West L.A. yuppieville:
In old downtown, if you put on you blinker sooner or later someone would let you into your desired lane, and it would happen no matter how crowded the road was. Downtown had been there for 60 years, it ain't gonna get up and run off, and no one felt that they had to get there before anyone else.
In much-newer West L.A., putting on your blinker serves as a signal that you're trying to get ahead, and the new generation of yuppies couldn't have that, so sure as shit someone would cut you off, and NO ONE would let you into you lane.
Here in the SoCal high desert, before the yuppie invasion everyone drove below the speed limit, everyone full-stopped at stop signs, and there was a good deal of "After you, my dear Alphonse". Since we've had our own yuppie invasion, things have changed radically. Polite drivers are now rare, rather than the norm. Everyone is in a mad hurry like they have to be there yesterday. Signal? Whazzat??
I recall reading some stats recently to the effect that your chances of survival are better (by something like 30-40%) if a private party drives you to the hospital immediately, rather than waiting for the ambulance. I don't recall what the reasons were, tho delay in emergencies has to be part of it.
Where I'm at, it's about 20 minutes to the hospital, if you drive sanely. It's about 40 minutes if you wait for the ambulance to arrive from town first.
In one part of North Dakota (near Jamestown, for those interested) I've seen highway patrol come up behind folks at night close enough that their lights are blinding 'em -- the idea is to get you to speed to get away from 'em, since they refuse to pass you.
(I'm wondering if this might be a great time to brake hard enough to get rear-ended, and claim a deer ran in front of you...)
The driver need not be the handicapped person. If there is someone in their immediate household who is handicapped, the vehicle is eligible for a handicapped sticker.
THat said, in my observation the current most common reason for people having handicapped stickers appears to be complications of obesity, including bad knees. I leave whether that should be an eligible reason as an exercise for the reader.
When to be skeptical is a judgment call, not an absolute. If you can't make judgment calls in your own field, and can't trust others expert in their fields to make judgment calls either, but rather disbelieve everything until proven so beyond a shadow of a doubt -- you're not a skeptic, you're a curmudgeon.
The inverse is just as valid. Note the omission of a single word (which brings your statement more into line with current reality as well):
"So when their leader tells them, for example, that global warming is real, they believe what they're told despite evidence to the contrary. To not believe is a threat."
Same here. I'm more inclined to let people into the lane ahead of me than not (where I'm going ain't gonna get up and run off) but if someone tries to FORCE his way in where he has no right of way, I don't feel like it's my duty to let him be an aggressive asshole. I didn't agree to be bullied.
Refusing to play the game is the best response, but sometimes you don't have that option (no way to walk away; nowhere to go but down the road you're already on). But if you give in to bullies, next time they get worse. If you stand up to them, some learn they can't get away with it, but some get mad. And those are the ones that need it demonstrated to 'em that no, they can't get away with just walking over the top of you.
People have been getting away with being aggressive drivers in overly-busy city traffic (sometimes leading to situations where you can't even GET anywhere if you don't push and shove same as everyone else).
BTW this makes a nifty parallel to internet bullying -- where people who would never behave that way face to face will be total jerks online. Same thing on the roadways.
Get an agent. There are a number of sites that can tell you how to go about this a lot better than I can. No one will speak to you until you have an agent anyway.
That's interesting... and why can't replacement lenses be made with UV protection in 'em??
I have my "original" unaltered lenses, and I see black lights as glaring purplish-blue, painfully bright. I've always taken this to mean that I see further into UV than normal. (Always figured it's cuz I also have the freak gene that lets you distinguish colours other people can't.)
I may see further into IR than normal, too -- I could always tell the state of the fire by how "black" my woodstove looked.
Same thing us farm types wonder about. Along with "day off". What the hell is THAT, and where do I get one??
BTW more for your work... if you don't already know about it, Kroll/Ontrack has several useful newsletters re the intersection of law and computer technology. http://www.krollontrack.com/newsletters/
Case Law Update & E-Discovery News Ontrack Inview User News Computer Forensics & Cyber Crime News
(You can get them delivered in plaintext, which is nice.)
Yep... just a different manufacturing route. Point being this is potentially waste-free (or nearly so).
Seems to me that combined with bacteria that concentrate various metals (notably toxics) this could be used for mining municipal garbage dumps. Grind it down fine, treat as needed, feed it to bacteria, and separate the slurry as it decomposes... We need to find a better way to dispose of that trash anyway, so why not maximize its usefulness?
That's kindof how I write fiction. Explain what's going on to someone else, then backfill until it's all seen from the characters' POV -- essentially comment, then code.
Likewise, I suspect it has to do with whether one is taught geography and mapmaking while still in grammar school. Which is probably why (all jokes aside) how well people read maps, follow directions, and avoid getting lost tends to be a regional thing that follows local education trends. Those who aren't *taught* these skills generally can't make sense of a map unless they've already been to the spot and can put the map into the context of known landmarks.
Slashdot Mirror
I know someone who had an abortion following testing that showed the child would be viable, but would have various gross abnormalities that precluded a normal life. Her reasoning, and I agree with her, is that this child would have NO quality of life, and she could not do that to a child. So she terminated it and tried again, and this time got a healthy, normal, and most of all HAPPY child, who is not saddled lifelong (however long that may be) with being unable to live in a reasonably normal manner.
But a lot of people seem to take it as personal affront -- how dare you suggest that I have defective genes!! even tho they know, intellectually, that they're condemning their defective child to life of misery merely by bringing it into the world at all.
I recall how some deaf parents threw a fit when it became possible for their deaf children to have near-normal hearing. They refused to do what was needed, because they felt that letting their children become hearing was a condemnation of the parents' own deaf status. (Something similar happened when hormone therapy made it possible for children of dwarf parents to grow to normal status. Some parents refused, on the grounds that making the kid grow up to be normal condemned the PARENTS as abnormal.)
Boils down to parents seeing the child as an extension of themselves, rather than as an independent person with its own life.
Now, as to the nominal topic, I think TFA has a good point -- there are people who behave aggressively, or passive-aggressive, because they fail to distinguish where "I" ends and where "shared" begins. No reason they'd be any better about it in their car, and people who piss on your leg to show their dominance are just as likely to mark their territory in other ways too.
Back to our side discussion, parents who set their kids up to fail (dress them badly so they stand out as outsiders, etc.) are often being territorial in the same way -- MY kid, MY tribe, not allowed to mingle with YOUR tribe, DON'T TOUCH MY STUFF. The kid is an extension of their personal territory.
Heh... that's like what I observed in Los Angeles, before downtown got renovated and became a subset of the West L.A. yuppieville:
In old downtown, if you put on you blinker sooner or later someone would let you into your desired lane, and it would happen no matter how crowded the road was. Downtown had been there for 60 years, it ain't gonna get up and run off, and no one felt that they had to get there before anyone else.
In much-newer West L.A., putting on your blinker serves as a signal that you're trying to get ahead, and the new generation of yuppies couldn't have that, so sure as shit someone would cut you off, and NO ONE would let you into you lane.
Here in the SoCal high desert, before the yuppie invasion everyone drove below the speed limit, everyone full-stopped at stop signs, and there was a good deal of "After you, my dear Alphonse". Since we've had our own yuppie invasion, things have changed radically. Polite drivers are now rare, rather than the norm. Everyone is in a mad hurry like they have to be there yesterday. Signal? Whazzat??
I recall reading some stats recently to the effect that your chances of survival are better (by something like 30-40%) if a private party drives you to the hospital immediately, rather than waiting for the ambulance. I don't recall what the reasons were, tho delay in emergencies has to be part of it.
Where I'm at, it's about 20 minutes to the hospital, if you drive sanely. It's about 40 minutes if you wait for the ambulance to arrive from town first.
In one part of North Dakota (near Jamestown, for those interested) I've seen highway patrol come up behind folks at night close enough that their lights are blinding 'em -- the idea is to get you to speed to get away from 'em, since they refuse to pass you.
(I'm wondering if this might be a great time to brake hard enough to get rear-ended, and claim a deer ran in front of you...)
The driver need not be the handicapped person. If there is someone in their immediate household who is handicapped, the vehicle is eligible for a handicapped sticker.
THat said, in my observation the current most common reason for people having handicapped stickers appears to be complications of obesity, including bad knees. I leave whether that should be an eligible reason as an exercise for the reader.
Best post of the day.
When to be skeptical is a judgment call, not an absolute. If you can't make judgment calls in your own field, and can't trust others expert in their fields to make judgment calls either, but rather disbelieve everything until proven so beyond a shadow of a doubt -- you're not a skeptic, you're a curmudgeon.
The inverse is just as valid. Note the omission of a single word (which brings your statement more into line with current reality as well):
"So when their leader tells them, for example, that global warming is real, they believe what they're told despite evidence to the contrary. To not believe is a threat."
Besides, what happens when today's correct belief becomes tomorrow's ridiculous misassumption, and today's mistaken belief becomes tomorrow's fact?
NOW who do you shame and embarrass??
Same here. I'm more inclined to let people into the lane ahead of me than not (where I'm going ain't gonna get up and run off) but if someone tries to FORCE his way in where he has no right of way, I don't feel like it's my duty to let him be an aggressive asshole. I didn't agree to be bullied.
Refusing to play the game is the best response, but sometimes you don't have that option (no way to walk away; nowhere to go but down the road you're already on). But if you give in to bullies, next time they get worse. If you stand up to them, some learn they can't get away with it, but some get mad. And those are the ones that need it demonstrated to 'em that no, they can't get away with just walking over the top of you.
People have been getting away with being aggressive drivers in overly-busy city traffic (sometimes leading to situations where you can't even GET anywhere if you don't push and shove same as everyone else).
BTW this makes a nifty parallel to internet bullying -- where people who would never behave that way face to face will be total jerks online. Same thing on the roadways.
Get an agent. There are a number of sites that can tell you how to go about this a lot better than I can. No one will speak to you until you have an agent anyway.
That's interesting... and why can't replacement lenses be made with UV protection in 'em??
I have my "original" unaltered lenses, and I see black lights as glaring purplish-blue, painfully bright. I've always taken this to mean that I see further into UV than normal. (Always figured it's cuz I also have the freak gene that lets you distinguish colours other people can't.)
I may see further into IR than normal, too -- I could always tell the state of the fire by how "black" my woodstove looked.
I'm sure glad you became a lawyer, and not an anesthesiologist
Same thing us farm types wonder about. Along with "day off". What the hell is THAT, and where do I get one??
BTW more for your work... if you don't already know about it, Kroll/Ontrack has several useful newsletters re the intersection of law and computer technology. http://www.krollontrack.com/newsletters/
Case Law Update & E-Discovery News
Ontrack Inview User News
Computer Forensics & Cyber Crime News
(You can get them delivered in plaintext, which is nice.)
Yep... just a different manufacturing route. Point being this is potentially waste-free (or nearly so).
Seems to me that combined with bacteria that concentrate various metals (notably toxics) this could be used for mining municipal garbage dumps. Grind it down fine, treat as needed, feed it to bacteria, and separate the slurry as it decomposes... We need to find a better way to dispose of that trash anyway, so why not maximize its usefulness?
Dunno what conditions are required. I've seen it once in a while in my freezer, when I bother making ice cubes. Might require extremely low humidity??
That's kindof how I write fiction. Explain what's going on to someone else, then backfill until it's all seen from the characters' POV -- essentially comment, then code.
You must live in Seattle!!
Likewise, I suspect it has to do with whether one is taught geography and mapmaking while still in grammar school. Which is probably why (all jokes aside) how well people read maps, follow directions, and avoid getting lost tends to be a regional thing that follows local education trends. Those who aren't *taught* these skills generally can't make sense of a map unless they've already been to the spot and can put the map into the context of known landmarks.
Works fine til the bargain outlet closes down. Meanwhile, the road remains 5 miles long.
Easily explained. Today the girls got mod points.
"...bacteria would most likely be polysaccharides or lipids."
Which sounds to me like a new source of raw materials for plastics.
So... when we build new refineries, it would make sense to design them so they're flexible and can use both biogarbage and crude oil.
;)
BTW, throw the horse over the fence some hay
Congrats, you've just reinvented the septic tank!!
Seriously, given bacteria's short lifespan and rapid reproduction, why shouldn't yesterday's used bugs be part of today's oil output??
As I recall, one theory of how oil is created is that it is STILL being created, by bacteria down in the oil-bearing strata.
I'm reminded of this fine auction:
http://www.doomgold.com/misc/ebay_kickass.gif
(Wish I knew how that one came out!)