Carpool lanes have been shown to carry more passenger-miles than non-HOV lanes
That may be true in some areas, but certainly not all. California is opening up some lanes to all traffic since they were underutilized, and there was rampant cheating.
New Jersey scrapped their HOV program because it didn't create a significant increase in carpooling. And what did they find? A reduction in congestion.
That's the only reason my mom bought a Prius, so they saved at least that much of the ozone
Saved the ozone with a hybrid? Internal combustion engines create pollutants that contribute to the creation of ground level ozone. They don't do anything to destroy the ozone layer.
If everyone is able to buy their way into the carpool lane doesn't that defeat the purpose?
To some extent. But carpool lanes have been around for a long time, and basically don't work. Think about all the tasks you frequently do on your way to and from work, or on your lunch break, etc. It's tough to stop and pick up your dry cleaning when you're riding in someone else's car.
So the carpool lanes are a lane that could be used for traffic, but is instead sitting there underutilized. If you remove the restriction from it and ease overall congestion, you're now creating a benefit in terms of pollution.
Of course, the idea of selling access to the lane is rather stupid, IMO. The taxpayers paid for the lane to be contructed and maintained, so selling limited access to it is a sneaky way for the state to generate extra revenue.
Formula 1 cars have had pneumatic valve actuators for ages, which (along with amazing attention to airflow) is part of the key to getting 800bhp from a 3 litre engine, but they're not exactly reliable.
Which is the whole reason that the "Too bad" comment is so annoying. Yes, there are kinds of technical things that can be done. But being able to put them in a test vehicle and demonstrate them, and having them survive 100K+ miles of real use is a different story.
Remember that in F1, teams will soon be required to use one engine per car for the entire weekend, something which they haven't had to worry about before. So amazing things are always possible, but not always with reliability and ease of manufacturing.
And to all the people who insist on condemning those who choose to drive an SUV, I'd ask the following:
1) what are the emissions of the vehicle you're currently driving?
2) How many kWh are your computers using per year to read/. and play games? What kinds of chemicals were spewed into the environment to make your new video card?
Yes, many people are out driving SUVs who could possibly get by just fine with something that wasn't as resource intensive. But before you condemn them, why not see what things you're doing that others might think are silly and a waste?
As a fan of older sports cars, I frequently see my fellow enthusiasts complaining about SUVs, and always have to remind them that many would consider our hobby to be wasteful and detrimental to the environment. The environmental and safety lobbyists who are currently targeting SUVs will simply move on to something else if they either get their way or when the trend dies off. These groups have been around for years, and have to keep finding new targets to keep the money rolling in....
There are plenty of possible explanations you could make for Trinity having this hack available in what is presumably supposed to be the year 2000 inside the Matrix.
What can't be explained is why the Cadillac CTS used in the highway chase scene is there, since that car wasn't available until 2002.
Well, it would also require that they greatly over-excavate the hole for the basement and backfill it with gravel or non-clay soil. That gets expensive very quickly.
Plus, people get upset with leaky basements, but don't care quite as much if their fraidy-hole has a bit of water running down the wall.
If you take a risk, cover yourself (insurance or otherwise). Don't expect the rest of us to care..
Uh, people who live in these areas _do_ typically have insurance to cover themselves. Your typical homeowners insurance policy covers tornadoes. Depending on where you live, it won't cover flood or earthquake damage: you have to get extra coverage for those.
Re:the 1999 Tornado killed because it was so huge
on
Surviving Tornadoes
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· Score: 1
I think people in most of the rest of the country have no idea how good the weather coverage is in Oklahoma.
I'll second that. The three years I spend in Tulsa showed me what good weather coverage is about. The TV stations all use street-level mapping to tell by the intersection where the storm is at. They have their own storm chasing crews reporting live on what they're observing. They understand when to break into programming and when not to.
Moving back to St. Louis, I became very annoyed with our stations here. They pretend to be concerned about severe weather by putting up the little warning maps in the corner of the screen, and breaking in all the time, even when it's a relatively minor severe storm. In Tulsa, they would use the commercial breaks to keep you informed of lesser storms. Stations in STL usually interrupt the programming, then end their 'severe weather update' right when the commercials start. It's easy to see their priorities.
Now, once a storm was to the point of producing tornadoes, the Tulsa stations would immediately break in and let you know the details.
As someone who's reasonably knowledgeable about weather, I much prefer having the kinds of details that the Oklahoma stations provided.
Re:the 1999 Tornado killed because it was so huge
on
Surviving Tornadoes
·
· Score: 1
That same storm cell went up I-44 and hit Tulsa a few hours later
That was a very tense night. We watched as the Tulsa stations broadcast feeds from their OKC network affiliates. Then watched the storm move our way.
Were you by any chance watching KJRH that night? Their studio rooftop camera was showing it live on the west side of the river. You could only see the funnel when there was enough lightning, or when it took down power lines. Very scary, but very cool for a weather geek...;)
They are? After the '99 Moore storm, the safety officials were promoting the building of an above-ground reinforced shelter. I know some people had below-ground shelters, but it seems the vast majority had nothing at all.
Well, it _was_ a Hollywood flick. Can't expect things to be too accurate. On the plus side, it did feature a real meteorologist, by the name of Jeff Lazalier. I'm pretty sure he's the one interviewing the chasers in the film (haven't seen it in years). Anyway, while I lived in the Tulsa area, I considered him to be one of the best TV meteorologists out there.
As for the Wichita TV crew, sure, you might not survive an F5 ducking into an overpass like they did, but you're also not likely to survive a direct hit by one in a ditch, either.
Perhaps the fact that '99s tornado was an F5 and this one was a F2 to low F3 has a little to do with the difference in damage/causualties?
Also, it wasn't like people didn't know the '99 storm was coming. It was being watched for quite a while as it approached Moore.
Re:Soldiers aren't worth as much.
on
Shuttle Politics
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· Score: 1
The families of the window washers who died in the WTC also got several million in government funds and charity.
Actually, they didn't. They way the federal payout was structured, people with higher current incomes and higher future earnings potential were valued at a higher rate than the window washer or busboy in the restaurant.
The funny part is that during this process, a lot of people were aghast at how values were placed on different lives. Except that this process happens every day in the courts for wrongful death lawsuits. If someone who earns $500,000 a year is killed, their family is out $500K a year. If someone who earns $40,000 a year is killed, they're out $40K a year. So compensation for a wrongful death is based on those numbers. Funny that while people think this is horrible and unfair, they have no problem with such valuation being placed on a person while they're alive (in the form of what their time is worth).
What gets me annoyed is not the fact that different people got different settlements, but the fact that if you were 'lucky' enough to be killed in the WTC, your family is taken care of by the feds and charities. But if you die in a car crash, get killed in a robbery, etc., your family is on their own. In reality, the money the feds allocated to the victims of Sept. 11 was nothing more than another bailout for the airlines, since as a condition of receiving that money, you had to waive your right to sue.
The space shuttle a product of "USA", United Space Alliance [unitedspacealliance.com], which is a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin.
More accurately, the USA manages the operations of the shuttle, plus many other launch systems. Rockwell was the one who built the shuttles (although many subcontractors, such as General Dynamics, Grumman, Fairchild, and McDonnell Douglas built major components).
Rockwell and Lockheed Martin were managing different parts of shuttle operations, and when NASA proposed moving to a single contractor, they formed USA. Rockwell's share of USA became Boeing when they sold their aerospace and defense business.
I'm not sure I'd block outbound SMTP... but it depends upon which set of hassles you like the most. There seems to be a slow (or, rather, glacial...) drift on the net toward authenticated SMTP for laptop users who move around a lot and who don't want to have to keep changing their outbound SMTP settings.
Exactly. While blocking outgoing 25 has benefits, the person who carries around a work laptop that relies on authenticated SMTP will be calling you when it won't work.
How anyone can say that with a straight face is beyond me.
The fossil record is easily explained by the global flood (which I suppose you'll want to debate next).
It can only be easily explained if you throw in a few 'miracles' and ignore the geological evidence. If there had been a global flood, the geology of the world would be much different.
The Bible has held true over the years while scientists in all their knowledge have had to change what they said on a regular basis as more information becomes available.
So the Earth is still at the center, with the Universe revolving around it?
Creationists *do not* believe that dinosaurs never existed.
Depends on the creationist in question. Many creationists also are strict adherents to the Earth being only a few thousand years old, as determined from the Bible. Therefore, they claim that all the fossil records were created by God when the Earth was created, and that those particular beasts never lived.
Another possibility would be the general persecution of Christians in general (most creationist are Christians).
At the great risk that this is a troll, I'm going to reply.
Could someone please explain how 'Christians' suddenly became so persecuted in the U.S.? Thinking about history, I see plenty of examples of Christians persecuting others: the Crusades, the Inquisition, witch trials, etc. Christians have forced 'In God We Trust' onto our money, inserted 'under God' into the Pledge of Allegiance.
Last I checked, any Christian was free to express their beliefs in any way they choose, so long as it doesn't infringe on the rights of others. Forcing prayer in school, the teaching of creationism (which has as much scientific credibility as the average infomercial), etc. are all things that infringe on my rights.
You can build your churches, have your TV and radio stations, your bumper stickers, etc. But quit trying to claim persecution as you attempt to shove your beliefs down the throats of others through government institutions.
Next time your watching to the news
Seems like what I see on the news are 'Christians' trying to prevent sex education, override good science, and ban Harry Potter. In the meantime, we're shown fluff stories about statues that people claim cause miracles, images of Mary, etc.
Re:"Young lady, in this house we obey the laws...
on
Energy From Vibrations
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
no he didn't he just said it would give EXTENDED talk time which would be true
Yes, the submitter did say that, but went on to speculate that you'd be wanting to get more calls in order to keep your battery charged, so the overall tone was that as long as you kept getting calls, you'd keep your battery charged.
It was fun right up until the swarms became people and I realized it was another bad hollywood script.
Yeah, like most of his books, it's an entertaining, quick read. But throughout, I kept imagining the movie version.
There's lots of foreshadowing and clues to what's happening sprinkled throught the story, so if you pay attention you can put most of it together.
I don't know enough about nanotech to know if Crichton has his technical details correct. He got a bit of hacker humor correct in terms of the T-shirts one of the programmers liked to wear, but mentioned coding sessions being fueled by Diet Coke (?)
Anyway, it's a book that makes you think for a bit about the possible problems with new technologies, especially when wrapped up in corporate survival.
As long as their ASCAP fees are paid up I imagine the music industry doesn't care where a radio station gets their music from.
If this were the case radio stations wouldn't be having to pay different royalties to the RIAA for making their audio available online.
But the RIAA says that these temporary copies in computer memory have to be paid for. And this particular situation really exposes the problem further. Why does a station have to pay extra royalties for the existence of an ephemeral copy, but most large stations have long-term copies on their automation systems?
Slashdot Mirror
Carpool lanes have been shown to carry more passenger-miles than non-HOV lanes
That may be true in some areas, but certainly not all. California is opening up some lanes to all traffic since they were underutilized, and there was rampant cheating.
New Jersey scrapped their HOV program because it didn't create a significant increase in carpooling. And what did they find? A reduction in congestion.
That's the only reason my mom bought a Prius, so they saved at least that much of the ozone
Saved the ozone with a hybrid? Internal combustion engines create pollutants that contribute to the creation of ground level ozone. They don't do anything to destroy the ozone layer.
If everyone is able to buy their way into the carpool lane doesn't that defeat the purpose?
To some extent. But carpool lanes have been around for a long time, and basically don't work. Think about all the tasks you frequently do on your way to and from work, or on your lunch break, etc. It's tough to stop and pick up your dry cleaning when you're riding in someone else's car.
So the carpool lanes are a lane that could be used for traffic, but is instead sitting there underutilized. If you remove the restriction from it and ease overall congestion, you're now creating a benefit in terms of pollution.
Of course, the idea of selling access to the lane is rather stupid, IMO. The taxpayers paid for the lane to be contructed and maintained, so selling limited access to it is a sneaky way for the state to generate extra revenue.
Formula 1 cars have had pneumatic valve actuators for ages, which (along with amazing attention to airflow) is part of the key to getting 800bhp from a 3 litre engine, but they're not exactly reliable.
/. and play games? What kinds of chemicals were spewed into the environment to make your new video card?
Which is the whole reason that the "Too bad" comment is so annoying. Yes, there are kinds of technical things that can be done. But being able to put them in a test vehicle and demonstrate them, and having them survive 100K+ miles of real use is a different story.
Remember that in F1, teams will soon be required to use one engine per car for the entire weekend, something which they haven't had to worry about before. So amazing things are always possible, but not always with reliability and ease of manufacturing.
And to all the people who insist on condemning those who choose to drive an SUV, I'd ask the following:
1) what are the emissions of the vehicle you're currently driving?
2) How many kWh are your computers using per year to read
Yes, many people are out driving SUVs who could possibly get by just fine with something that wasn't as resource intensive. But before you condemn them, why not see what things you're doing that others might think are silly and a waste?
As a fan of older sports cars, I frequently see my fellow enthusiasts complaining about SUVs, and always have to remind them that many would consider our hobby to be wasteful and detrimental to the environment. The environmental and safety lobbyists who are currently targeting SUVs will simply move on to something else if they either get their way or when the trend dies off. These groups have been around for years, and have to keep finding new targets to keep the money rolling in....
Love the eighties style Knight Rider moving LED though, a real touch of class that.
Glad I'm not the only one that immediately thought of Knight Rider when the page loaded. It's scary that as a kid I loved that show.
There are plenty of possible explanations you could make for Trinity having this hack available in what is presumably supposed to be the year 2000 inside the Matrix.
What can't be explained is why the Cadillac CTS used in the highway chase scene is there, since that car wasn't available until 2002.
Well, it would also require that they greatly over-excavate the hole for the basement and backfill it with gravel or non-clay soil. That gets expensive very quickly.
Plus, people get upset with leaky basements, but don't care quite as much if their fraidy-hole has a bit of water running down the wall.
If you take a risk, cover yourself (insurance or otherwise). Don't expect the rest of us to care..
Uh, people who live in these areas _do_ typically have insurance to cover themselves. Your typical homeowners insurance policy covers tornadoes. Depending on where you live, it won't cover flood or earthquake damage: you have to get extra coverage for those.
I think people in most of the rest of the country have no idea how good the weather coverage is in Oklahoma.
I'll second that. The three years I spend in Tulsa showed me what good weather coverage is about. The TV stations all use street-level mapping to tell by the intersection where the storm is at. They have their own storm chasing crews reporting live on what they're observing. They understand when to break into programming and when not to.
Moving back to St. Louis, I became very annoyed with our stations here. They pretend to be concerned about severe weather by putting up the little warning maps in the corner of the screen, and breaking in all the time, even when it's a relatively minor severe storm. In Tulsa, they would use the commercial breaks to keep you informed of lesser storms. Stations in STL usually interrupt the programming, then end their 'severe weather update' right when the commercials start. It's easy to see their priorities.
Now, once a storm was to the point of producing tornadoes, the Tulsa stations would immediately break in and let you know the details.
As someone who's reasonably knowledgeable about weather, I much prefer having the kinds of details that the Oklahoma stations provided.
That same storm cell went up I-44 and hit Tulsa a few hours later
;)
That was a very tense night. We watched as the Tulsa stations broadcast feeds from their OKC network affiliates. Then watched the storm move our way.
Were you by any chance watching KJRH that night? Their studio rooftop camera was showing it live on the west side of the river. You could only see the funnel when there was enough lightning, or when it took down power lines. Very scary, but very cool for a weather geek...
90% of them are in-gound garage shelters
They are? After the '99 Moore storm, the safety officials were promoting the building of an above-ground reinforced shelter. I know some people had below-ground shelters, but it seems the vast majority had nothing at all.
Twister was a pile of junk.
Well, it _was_ a Hollywood flick. Can't expect things to be too accurate. On the plus side, it did feature a real meteorologist, by the name of Jeff Lazalier. I'm pretty sure he's the one interviewing the chasers in the film (haven't seen it in years). Anyway, while I lived in the Tulsa area, I considered him to be one of the best TV meteorologists out there.
As for the Wichita TV crew, sure, you might not survive an F5 ducking into an overpass like they did, but you're also not likely to survive a direct hit by one in a ditch, either.
Perhaps the fact that '99s tornado was an F5 and this one was a F2 to low F3 has a little to do with the difference in damage/causualties?
Also, it wasn't like people didn't know the '99 storm was coming. It was being watched for quite a while as it approached Moore.
The families of the window washers who died in the WTC also got several million in government funds and charity.
Actually, they didn't. They way the federal payout was structured, people with higher current incomes and higher future earnings potential were valued at a higher rate than the window washer or busboy in the restaurant.
The funny part is that during this process, a lot of people were aghast at how values were placed on different lives. Except that this process happens every day in the courts for wrongful death lawsuits. If someone who earns $500,000 a year is killed, their family is out $500K a year. If someone who earns $40,000 a year is killed, they're out $40K a year. So compensation for a wrongful death is based on those numbers. Funny that while people think this is horrible and unfair, they have no problem with such valuation being placed on a person while they're alive (in the form of what their time is worth).
What gets me annoyed is not the fact that different people got different settlements, but the fact that if you were 'lucky' enough to be killed in the WTC, your family is taken care of by the feds and charities. But if you die in a car crash, get killed in a robbery, etc., your family is on their own. In reality, the money the feds allocated to the victims of Sept. 11 was nothing more than another bailout for the airlines, since as a condition of receiving that money, you had to waive your right to sue.
The space shuttle a product of "USA", United Space Alliance [unitedspacealliance.com], which is a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin.
More accurately, the USA manages the operations of the shuttle, plus many other launch systems. Rockwell was the one who built the shuttles (although many subcontractors, such as General Dynamics, Grumman, Fairchild, and McDonnell Douglas built major components).
Rockwell and Lockheed Martin were managing different parts of shuttle operations, and when NASA proposed moving to a single contractor, they formed USA. Rockwell's share of USA became Boeing when they sold their aerospace and defense business.
I'm not sure I'd block outbound SMTP... but it depends upon which set of hassles you like the most. There seems to be a slow (or, rather, glacial...) drift on the net toward authenticated SMTP for laptop users who move around a lot and who don't want to have to keep changing their outbound SMTP settings.
Exactly. While blocking outgoing 25 has benefits, the person who carries around a work laptop that relies on authenticated SMTP will be calling you when it won't work.
The scientifically sound creationists
How anyone can say that with a straight face is beyond me.
The fossil record is easily explained by the global flood (which I suppose you'll want to debate next).
It can only be easily explained if you throw in a few 'miracles' and ignore the geological evidence. If there had been a global flood, the geology of the world would be much different.
The Bible has held true over the years while scientists in all their knowledge have had to change what they said on a regular basis as more information becomes available.
So the Earth is still at the center, with the Universe revolving around it?
Creationists *do not* believe that dinosaurs never existed.
Depends on the creationist in question. Many creationists also are strict adherents to the Earth being only a few thousand years old, as determined from the Bible. Therefore, they claim that all the fossil records were created by God when the Earth was created, and that those particular beasts never lived.
Well, you see, the HIV is constantly evolving. Any doctor who does not believe that evolution is a fact should not be working with HIV.
Of course, said doctor probably wouldn't be doing HIV research, since he'd also believe that it was a punishment from God.
Another possibility would be the general persecution of Christians in general (most creationist are Christians).
At the great risk that this is a troll, I'm going to reply.
Could someone please explain how 'Christians' suddenly became so persecuted in the U.S.? Thinking about history, I see plenty of examples of Christians persecuting others: the Crusades, the Inquisition, witch trials, etc. Christians have forced 'In God We Trust' onto our money, inserted 'under God' into the Pledge of Allegiance.
Last I checked, any Christian was free to express their beliefs in any way they choose, so long as it doesn't infringe on the rights of others. Forcing prayer in school, the teaching of creationism (which has as much scientific credibility as the average infomercial), etc. are all things that infringe on my rights.
You can build your churches, have your TV and radio stations, your bumper stickers, etc. But quit trying to claim persecution as you attempt to shove your beliefs down the throats of others through government institutions.
Next time your watching to the news
Seems like what I see on the news are 'Christians' trying to prevent sex education, override good science, and ban Harry Potter. In the meantime, we're shown fluff stories about statues that people claim cause miracles, images of Mary, etc.
no he didn't he just said it would give EXTENDED talk time which would be true
Yes, the submitter did say that, but went on to speculate that you'd be wanting to get more calls in order to keep your battery charged, so the overall tone was that as long as you kept getting calls, you'd keep your battery charged.
It was fun right up until the swarms became people and I realized it was another bad hollywood script.
Yeah, like most of his books, it's an entertaining, quick read. But throughout, I kept imagining the movie version.
There's lots of foreshadowing and clues to what's happening sprinkled throught the story, so if you pay attention you can put most of it together.
I don't know enough about nanotech to know if Crichton has his technical details correct. He got a bit of hacker humor correct in terms of the T-shirts one of the programmers liked to wear, but mentioned coding sessions being fueled by Diet Coke (?)
Anyway, it's a book that makes you think for a bit about the possible problems with new technologies, especially when wrapped up in corporate survival.
As long as their ASCAP fees are paid up I imagine the music industry doesn't care where a radio station gets their music from.
If this were the case radio stations wouldn't be having to pay different royalties to the RIAA for making their audio available online.
But the RIAA says that these temporary copies in computer memory have to be paid for. And this particular situation really exposes the problem further. Why does a station have to pay extra royalties for the existence of an ephemeral copy, but most large stations have long-term copies on their automation systems?
Have you tried Reqwireless WebViewer [reqwireless.com]?
Nope. Will check into it.