I should have said, recovers to its real value. Obviously it's a lot less likely to recover all the way up to a bubble value, at least not until sufficient time for inflation has passed.
Per your link, that's a good example of how Japan's culture has a "gotta have it no matter the cost, or you're too uncool to live" factor permeating it from top to bottom, to the point that even otherwise-rational adults are affected, at every level. I remember when Japanese businessmen just HAD to own an American golf course, even tho it was in an era when golf courses were going out of business all over the place. How did they think they were going to do anything but take a drubbing on that sort of investment?!
I know someone who made a good living exporting vehicles to Japan in the 1980s. What was the most in-demand? Crew-cab dually pickups, that you can't even drive in most of Japan because they're just too BIG. The buyers had absolutely no use for them, but HAD TO HAVE THEM because someone else in their status bracket had one.
What makes you think aliens are necessarily any "better" or even particularly different? In fact, it's far more likely that any aliens wandering this far out (being we're on the wrong side of the galactic tracks) WILL be aggressive.
Exploration is a function of aggression. Maybe not overtly, but the ultimate object of exploration is expansion for your species, whether for living space, resources, or whatever.
In fact, failure to proactively defend our planet MIGHT be interpreted as CEDING our planet to said aliens.
We just don't KNOW. But it's foolish to assume that just because someone is exploring the Far Reaches of the Galaxy, that they necessarily come in peace and friendship. We need only look at ourselves for an example, and there is absolutely NO reason to believe that human behaviour is all that unique.
And just because someone is firing a shotgun at your steamship doesn't mean your boiler can't independently fail and explode.
I think you're right about the early-explorer thing -- just look at where Earth is on the galactic map. The only way we could be closer to bumfuck nullspace is to leave the galaxy entirely. Why the hell would anyone come clear out here?
1) Explorers 2) Refugees 3) Fleeing criminals
And remember, our little radio envelope, only a couple hundred light years across, is but a grain of sand on a remote beach. Someone *might* trip over it, but odds are against it.
You gotta remember that on the galactic map, we're WAY the hell out in bumfuck nullspace, about as far from the galactic mainstream as possible without leaving the galaxy entirely. How many people make a research trip or vacation trek out to the last island in the Aleutian chain, or to the wilds of northern Greenland? A: Almost none.
In terms of galactic space, Earth is out in a remote area where there's probably no reason for anyone to come on ordinary business (from the galactic mainstream, only first-frontier explorers and fleeing criminals are likely to come this way), and only since the advent of radio have we been advertising our existence. Wander within 100 light years of Earth, and you might notice us. But the Milky Way is a big place, something like 100,000LY across. What's the chance that ANYONE would trip over the tiny fraction of a percent of the galaxy that comprises our volume of radio space?? About equivalent to finding a single marble lying among the rocks on some random Aleut beach. It could happen, but odds are against it.
Pearl Harbor. Until someone openly admitted to it years later, it didn't come out that TPTB *knew* about the impending attack, and chose to allow it to happen as isolationism-breaking. (Or so is my fuzzy understanding. I'm not a WW2 historian.) And our intelligence depts. ran a number of scams on Soviet intelligence, with no one outside the Company the wiser til it was admitted to after the Cold War ended. I'm sure there are other examples. Point being, the gov't can be VERY secretive when it really wants to be. (OTOH, it can also be VERY good at spreading disinformation, which is much the same thing as seen from the other end.)
As to the late party of the affidavit, I *think* this is my college prof's buddy... said prof told us (back in ~1974) that his Lieutenant buddy had been told about these bodies by *his* C.O., who had personally seen them. At any rate, the circumstances were an exact match for TFA's contentions. Hardly proof, but more than purely hearsay.
OTOH, considering that the gov't isn't shy about borrowing technology, especially in wartime (and the Cold War may not have been a shooting war, but remember the arms race and its pressing need to be the first with every new tech?) either the crash is indeed a myth, or there was very little left of the spacecraft; or nothing that was significantly beyond what we were already working on, ie. was the interstellar equivalent of a Volkswagen, meant as nothing more than a simple lander, or maybe not even meant to land at all (oh shit, we're going down, how do you land this thing? help! *splat*)
You gotta wonder how many of the "great monuments" and "mysteries of the ancient world" were exactly that -- practical jokes. And there will always be someone with the time and resources to do it. Look how long two guys fooled the world about "crop circles".
Some birds also use their wings (rather, the knob that corresponds to a human wrist) to beat the crap out of rivals and/or predators. Ever REALLY get on the wrong side of a goose? It's not just the beak you ought to be afraid of!!
As to balance, and the necessity of limbs or tails as counterweights, that will be universal everywhere gravity applies.
But, someone pipes up, what about life that develops in deep space? There's just one problem with that concept -- first you have to sweep enough atoms into the same vicinity (space, by definition, is mighty thin on such stuff) and by the time you've got enough molecules built up for a critter bigger than a microbe, you've got enough gravity to matter.
[goes off, spends whole evening reading links from your post]
All very interesting... and I've been wondering how people with a $60k income and 2.3 children are "affording" $500k starter homes. Answer: They're not, not really.
Fortunately, I got into my place in 2001, before the bubble hit this area, with a fixed-rate mortgage... market value doubled a year later, and in 2005 was 8 TIMES what I'd paid in 2001. Now it's down to merely 4x its 2001 value, while starter houses are listed at about half what they were a year ago. -- Lots of realtors hereabouts got rich and then got caught in the same trap (you'd think they'd know better) and are now desperate for clients.
Ultimately the RE market always recovers (and re-inflates), but you can bet a lot of people will take a dunking in the years between. I need to move and buy again myself, but am leery of current prices, as I *know* the wage market where I'm headed (back to farm country), and it won't cover a $150k house, let alone what's become typical there. Once the bubble gets done with the mountain and midwest areas, there's going to be a lot of poverty for the next generation.
Good concise explanation, thanks. I guess I never thought too much about it, because I'm of the "$5000 for a TV, are you nuts?!" persuasion. If I don't have the cash, I don't buy the luxury.
The housing market is indeed just plain nuts, and it's affecting prices in rural America to the point that ordinary working stiffs can no longer buy a house. I'm trying to get moved back to said rural America (from SoCal) but lordy, they want HOW MUCH for a few acres and an old trailer?!?! A major "market correction" would make me mighty happy, especially since I decided to keep my present place (bought before the boom) and use it as a rental instead of selling it.
When I was in school (graduated from HS in 1972) I don't think I'd ever even heard of anyone cheating. It just wasn't done. One has to wonder to what degree cheating is encouraged by feelgood systems (and feelgood rewards), which my school most pointedly lacked -- there, you got whatever you got *entirely* on your own merits.
Overview Sea Shepherd Conservation Society "We're not a protest organization, we're a policing organization," Paul Watson has said of his Sea Shepherd Conservation Society (SSCS). A pirate organization is more like it. Sporting the skull and crossbones, his black or battleship-gray ships sail menacingly through the waves. They are painted with the names of the boats Watson has rammed and sunk.
The ships are fitted with water cannons, a concrete-filled bow made for ramming, and an attachment dubbed the "can opener" that can tear open a boat's hull. In his book Earth Warrior, David Morris writes that Watson wears a long bowie knife at his side and carries AK-47s on board. He blasts Richard Wagner's rousing "Ride of the Valkyries" to herald his arrival and terrify his victims.
SSCS's mission is to stop fishing of which it disapproves. Its preferred methods? Ramming and sinking fishing ships, throwing butyric acid on their decks, and firing machine guns. Watson argues that United Nations resolutions authorize him to commit violent acts. But he regularly interferes with fisherman and hunters who are committing no crime. He serves as judge, jury, and executioner -- while enjoying the same tax-exempt status as universities and churches.
Some of the animal-rights movement's most notorious terrorists got their start with SSCS. One of them, convicted arsonist Rodney Coronado, had Watson's approval to plan and execute an attack on Iceland's whaling industry. He and a colleague sank two of the fleet's four ships and destroyed a processing facility.
The Birth of Violence
SSCS is run with an iron fist by its founder, "Captain" Paul Watson. "When this ship becomes a democracy," he likes to say to his crew, "you'll be the first to know." Watson is a dyslexic who "progressed from deckhand to able seaman without knowing how to tie a knot" with the Canadian Coast Guard and Norwegian and Swedish merchant marines.
In Vancouver, Watson joined a group of anti-war activists who attempted to forcibly shut down American nuclear tests. These radicals branched out into environmental activism and became Greenpeace, of which Watson was a founder. But Watson's violent tactics became too much for Greenpeace, which kicked him out in 1977, after he assaulted seal hunters. Watson now assails his old comrades for being too wimpy, calling Greenpeace "the Avon ladies of the environmental movement."
Soon after Watson's eviction from Greenpeace, Sea Shepherd and its ship-ramming philosophy were born. SSCS's band of pirates have disrupted the legal Canadian seal hunt, attacked whaling ships and fishing boats using driftnets, and taken credit for spiking (inserting large nails into) thousands of trees. The group has sunk at least ten ships in Iceland, Norway, Spain, Portugal, South Africa, and the Canary Islands. Watson has even sunk his own ships rather than let the authorities take them. And he has spent time in the jails of Canada and the Netherlands. "Any whaling ship on the ocean is a target for the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society," he has said.
Watson's love for marine life doesn't stop him from eating fish. "Paul, who likes hamburgers and grilled cheese sandwiches equally, interprets veganism as a form of philosophical lunacy," David Morris writes in Earth Warrior. Morris's book details often-hilarious disputes between Watson and the vegan crewmembers. One standoff ensued when Watson ordered the vegans to retrieve a driftnet left by an escaped fishing vessel. The crew took an agonizingly long time, trying to free every squid caught in the net, about which Watson couldn't care less. He didn't even mind profiting from the work of the ship he threatened -- Morris reports that he later sent his chef over to the net to "requisition a few squid for dinner."
Yeah, there is that... that's a pretty stiff cost even for a small commercial photo shoot that might not be covered under a studio's blanket insurance. One has to wonder just who might have lobbied for these requirements... short-term insurers, perhaps??
Stole the distributor? That's just weird... unless, of course, it was a "purchase" by "Midnight Auto Parts".
Which is why I have a chain and padlock holding down my truck's hood -- I got tired of "donating" my battery.
Shit, anyone else remember when at least in small-town America, it was perfectly safe to leave your car RUNNING while you ran into the store for a moment? Things have sure gone downhill.:(
But commercial photography has required a permit for a long time, precisely for the reasons you say -- their activities disrupt traffic (foot and motor). Requiring a permit in this case is reasonable since it also informs emergency services that today is NOT a good day to rely on Avenue X for your best route to Location Y.
However, this has nothing to do with photography by individuals, even those armed with a tripod -- that won't take up any more space or cause any more disruption than would two people standing still on the sidewalk. Yet individuals are covered by these new rules.
IMO the *real* reasoning here is to have an approximate record of WHO PHOTOGRAPHS WHAT, in case the OMG-TERRORISTS are casing targets. After all everyone knows that no self-respecting terrorist would trust a picture of a building from any other source!!
What I wonder is, since the permit is "free" (that is, the requisite record-keeping and paperwork are paid for by tax dollars) -- why are these permits required in the first place?
Yes, for commercial movie productions, there is some logic to it, because these productions disrupt traffic etc. But for private parties, the ONLY possible explanation is a desire to track WHO PHOTOGRAPHED WHAT. File under "chilling effects".
And then give all the best footage to the various media outlets, most especially the tabloid types that will spin it to its worst advantage, so that the entire metro population could become suitably outraged.
"He may perform on recording, but how about everyone else? Did he hire them or did his record company? Who mastered it? Who were the audio engineers in charge of it? Are they his employees or his record companies?"
The functionaries you list are almost always paid by the hour *at the time* the recording is made, and have no rights to future income. So they've already made their money off it, and would do so whether it was sold, given away, or flushed down the toilet.
Slashdot Mirror
I should have said, recovers to its real value. Obviously it's a lot less likely to recover all the way up to a bubble value, at least not until sufficient time for inflation has passed.
Per your link, that's a good example of how Japan's culture has a "gotta have it no matter the cost, or you're too uncool to live" factor permeating it from top to bottom, to the point that even otherwise-rational adults are affected, at every level. I remember when Japanese businessmen just HAD to own an American golf course, even tho it was in an era when golf courses were going out of business all over the place. How did they think they were going to do anything but take a drubbing on that sort of investment?!
I know someone who made a good living exporting vehicles to Japan in the 1980s. What was the most in-demand? Crew-cab dually pickups, that you can't even drive in most of Japan because they're just too BIG. The buyers had absolutely no use for them, but HAD TO HAVE THEM because someone else in their status bracket had one.
What makes you think aliens are necessarily any "better" or even particularly different? In fact, it's far more likely that any aliens wandering this far out (being we're on the wrong side of the galactic tracks) WILL be aggressive.
Exploration is a function of aggression. Maybe not overtly, but the ultimate object of exploration is expansion for your species, whether for living space, resources, or whatever.
In fact, failure to proactively defend our planet MIGHT be interpreted as CEDING our planet to said aliens.
We just don't KNOW. But it's foolish to assume that just because someone is exploring the Far Reaches of the Galaxy, that they necessarily come in peace and friendship. We need only look at ourselves for an example, and there is absolutely NO reason to believe that human behaviour is all that unique.
And just because someone is firing a shotgun at your steamship doesn't mean your boiler can't independently fail and explode.
I think you're right about the early-explorer thing -- just look at where Earth is on the galactic map. The only way we could be closer to bumfuck nullspace is to leave the galaxy entirely. Why the hell would anyone come clear out here?
1) Explorers
2) Refugees
3) Fleeing criminals
And remember, our little radio envelope, only a couple hundred light years across, is but a grain of sand on a remote beach. Someone *might* trip over it, but odds are against it.
You gotta remember that on the galactic map, we're WAY the hell out in bumfuck nullspace, about as far from the galactic mainstream as possible without leaving the galaxy entirely. How many people make a research trip or vacation trek out to the last island in the Aleutian chain, or to the wilds of northern Greenland? A: Almost none.
In terms of galactic space, Earth is out in a remote area where there's probably no reason for anyone to come on ordinary business (from the galactic mainstream, only first-frontier explorers and fleeing criminals are likely to come this way), and only since the advent of radio have we been advertising our existence. Wander within 100 light years of Earth, and you might notice us. But the Milky Way is a big place, something like 100,000LY across. What's the chance that ANYONE would trip over the tiny fraction of a percent of the galaxy that comprises our volume of radio space?? About equivalent to finding a single marble lying among the rocks on some random Aleut beach. It could happen, but odds are against it.
Pearl Harbor. Until someone openly admitted to it years later, it didn't come out that TPTB *knew* about the impending attack, and chose to allow it to happen as isolationism-breaking. (Or so is my fuzzy understanding. I'm not a WW2 historian.) And our intelligence depts. ran a number of scams on Soviet intelligence, with no one outside the Company the wiser til it was admitted to after the Cold War ended. I'm sure there are other examples. Point being, the gov't can be VERY secretive when it really wants to be. (OTOH, it can also be VERY good at spreading disinformation, which is much the same thing as seen from the other end.)
As to the late party of the affidavit, I *think* this is my college prof's buddy... said prof told us (back in ~1974) that his Lieutenant buddy had been told about these bodies by *his* C.O., who had personally seen them. At any rate, the circumstances were an exact match for TFA's contentions. Hardly proof, but more than purely hearsay.
OTOH, considering that the gov't isn't shy about borrowing technology, especially in wartime (and the Cold War may not have been a shooting war, but remember the arms race and its pressing need to be the first with every new tech?) either the crash is indeed a myth, or there was very little left of the spacecraft; or nothing that was significantly beyond what we were already working on, ie. was the interstellar equivalent of a Volkswagen, meant as nothing more than a simple lander, or maybe not even meant to land at all (oh shit, we're going down, how do you land this thing? help! *splat*)
Hmm. How about yourself? ;)
You gotta wonder how many of the "great monuments" and "mysteries of the ancient world" were exactly that -- practical jokes. And there will always be someone with the time and resources to do it. Look how long two guys fooled the world about "crop circles".
Some birds also use their wings (rather, the knob that corresponds to a human wrist) to beat the crap out of rivals and/or predators. Ever REALLY get on the wrong side of a goose? It's not just the beak you ought to be afraid of!!
As to balance, and the necessity of limbs or tails as counterweights, that will be universal everywhere gravity applies.
But, someone pipes up, what about life that develops in deep space? There's just one problem with that concept -- first you have to sweep enough atoms into the same vicinity (space, by definition, is mighty thin on such stuff) and by the time you've got enough molecules built up for a critter bigger than a microbe, you've got enough gravity to matter.
.
.
.
.
[I can't believe I typed that.]
"Definitely 'unexpected' since sidewinders had not been invented."
Nonsense. We just used our time machine to go and fetch one.
[goes off, spends whole evening reading links from your post]
All very interesting... and I've been wondering how people with a $60k income and 2.3 children are "affording" $500k starter homes. Answer: They're not, not really.
Fortunately, I got into my place in 2001, before the bubble hit this area, with a fixed-rate mortgage... market value doubled a year later, and in 2005 was 8 TIMES what I'd paid in 2001. Now it's down to merely 4x its 2001 value, while starter houses are listed at about half what they were a year ago. -- Lots of realtors hereabouts got rich and then got caught in the same trap (you'd think they'd know better) and are now desperate for clients.
Ultimately the RE market always recovers (and re-inflates), but you can bet a lot of people will take a dunking in the years between. I need to move and buy again myself, but am leery of current prices, as I *know* the wage market where I'm headed (back to farm country), and it won't cover a $150k house, let alone what's become typical there. Once the bubble gets done with the mountain and midwest areas, there's going to be a lot of poverty for the next generation.
Good concise explanation, thanks. I guess I never thought too much about it, because I'm of the "$5000 for a TV, are you nuts?!" persuasion. If I don't have the cash, I don't buy the luxury.
The housing market is indeed just plain nuts, and it's affecting prices in rural America to the point that ordinary working stiffs can no longer buy a house. I'm trying to get moved back to said rural America (from SoCal) but lordy, they want HOW MUCH for a few acres and an old trailer?!?! A major "market correction" would make me mighty happy, especially since I decided to keep my present place (bought before the boom) and use it as a rental instead of selling it.
When I was in school (graduated from HS in 1972) I don't think I'd ever even heard of anyone cheating. It just wasn't done. One has to wonder to what degree cheating is encouraged by feelgood systems (and feelgood rewards), which my school most pointedly lacked -- there, you got whatever you got *entirely* on your own merits.
You're different and strange :)
But point being, it had a penalty you perceived as real and significant to *your* world. And that's what the parent poster was talking about.
From http://www.activistcash.com/organization_overview. cfm/oid/347
============
Overview
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society "We're not a protest organization, we're a policing organization," Paul Watson has said of his Sea Shepherd Conservation Society (SSCS). A pirate organization is more like it. Sporting the skull and crossbones, his black or battleship-gray ships sail menacingly through the waves. They are painted with the names of the boats Watson has rammed and sunk.
The ships are fitted with water cannons, a concrete-filled bow made for ramming, and an attachment dubbed the "can opener" that can tear open a boat's hull. In his book Earth Warrior, David Morris writes that Watson wears a long bowie knife at his side and carries AK-47s on board. He blasts Richard Wagner's rousing "Ride of the Valkyries" to herald his arrival and terrify his victims.
SSCS's mission is to stop fishing of which it disapproves. Its preferred methods? Ramming and sinking fishing ships, throwing butyric acid on their decks, and firing machine guns. Watson argues that United Nations resolutions authorize him to commit violent acts. But he regularly interferes with fisherman and hunters who are committing no crime. He serves as judge, jury, and executioner -- while enjoying the same tax-exempt status as universities and churches.
Some of the animal-rights movement's most notorious terrorists got their start with SSCS. One of them, convicted arsonist Rodney Coronado, had Watson's approval to plan and execute an attack on Iceland's whaling industry. He and a colleague sank two of the fleet's four ships and destroyed a processing facility.
The Birth of Violence
SSCS is run with an iron fist by its founder, "Captain" Paul Watson. "When this ship becomes a democracy," he likes to say to his crew, "you'll be the first to know." Watson is a dyslexic who "progressed from deckhand to able seaman without knowing how to tie a knot" with the Canadian Coast Guard and Norwegian and Swedish merchant marines.
In Vancouver, Watson joined a group of anti-war activists who attempted to forcibly shut down American nuclear tests. These radicals branched out into environmental activism and became Greenpeace, of which Watson was a founder. But Watson's violent tactics became too much for Greenpeace, which kicked him out in 1977, after he assaulted seal hunters. Watson now assails his old comrades for being too wimpy, calling Greenpeace "the Avon ladies of the environmental movement."
Soon after Watson's eviction from Greenpeace, Sea Shepherd and its ship-ramming philosophy were born. SSCS's band of pirates have disrupted the legal Canadian seal hunt, attacked whaling ships and fishing boats using driftnets, and taken credit for spiking (inserting large nails into) thousands of trees. The group has sunk at least ten ships in Iceland, Norway, Spain, Portugal, South Africa, and the Canary Islands. Watson has even sunk his own ships rather than let the authorities take them. And he has spent time in the jails of Canada and the Netherlands. "Any whaling ship on the ocean is a target for the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society," he has said.
Watson's love for marine life doesn't stop him from eating fish. "Paul, who likes hamburgers and grilled cheese sandwiches equally, interprets veganism as a form of philosophical lunacy," David Morris writes in Earth Warrior. Morris's book details often-hilarious disputes between Watson and the vegan crewmembers. One standoff ensued when Watson ordered the vegans to retrieve a driftnet left by an escaped fishing vessel. The crew took an agonizingly long time, trying to free every squid caught in the net, about which Watson couldn't care less. He didn't even mind profiting from the work of the ship he threatened -- Morris reports that he later sent his chef over to the net to "requisition a few squid for dinner."
On the Fringe
Paul Watson has used his aggres
You make an important point: "ousting them *in public*."
Fear of embarrassment after being caught is a powerful anti-cheat motivator in school, and I'm sure it works just as well in a game environment.
Well, not really -- after all, if you get murdered, that's personal even tho it makes the evening news ;)
Yeah, there is that... that's a pretty stiff cost even for a small commercial photo shoot that might not be covered under a studio's blanket insurance. One has to wonder just who might have lobbied for these requirements ... short-term insurers, perhaps??
[blink] So borrowing directly causes inflation??
Stole the distributor? That's just weird... unless, of course, it was a "purchase" by "Midnight Auto Parts".
:(
Which is why I have a chain and padlock holding down my truck's hood -- I got tired of "donating" my battery.
Shit, anyone else remember when at least in small-town America, it was perfectly safe to leave your car RUNNING while you ran into the store for a moment? Things have sure gone downhill.
Do what police in Seattle recommended some years ago, when no car radio was safe:
Leave your car unlocked.
That way at least you don't have to replace the window all the time.
(Better solution: move out of Seattle!)
Obviously your "non-saving" camera is transmitting images to your hidden secret base. Into the police van, komrade!!
But commercial photography has required a permit for a long time, precisely for the reasons you say -- their activities disrupt traffic (foot and motor). Requiring a permit in this case is reasonable since it also informs emergency services that today is NOT a good day to rely on Avenue X for your best route to Location Y.
However, this has nothing to do with photography by individuals, even those armed with a tripod -- that won't take up any more space or cause any more disruption than would two people standing still on the sidewalk. Yet individuals are covered by these new rules.
IMO the *real* reasoning here is to have an approximate record of WHO PHOTOGRAPHS WHAT, in case the OMG-TERRORISTS are casing targets. After all everyone knows that no self-respecting terrorist would trust a picture of a building from any other source!!
"The article mentions that two or more people who linger in a spot more than 30 minutes are subject to the new rules."
How does this not violate our Constitutionally protected right to freedom of assembly??
What I wonder is, since the permit is "free" (that is, the requisite record-keeping and paperwork are paid for by tax dollars) -- why are these permits required in the first place?
Yes, for commercial movie productions, there is some logic to it, because these productions disrupt traffic etc. But for private parties, the ONLY possible explanation is a desire to track WHO PHOTOGRAPHED WHAT. File under "chilling effects".
And then give all the best footage to the various media outlets, most especially the tabloid types that will spin it to its worst advantage, so that the entire metro population could become suitably outraged.
"He may perform on recording, but how about everyone else? Did he hire them or did his record company? Who mastered it? Who were the audio engineers in charge of it? Are they his employees or his record companies?"
The functionaries you list are almost always paid by the hour *at the time* the recording is made, and have no rights to future income. So they've already made their money off it, and would do so whether it was sold, given away, or flushed down the toilet.