mbeckman:..."What emboldens warmist scientists and modellers, beyond institutional backing and the advantages of groupthink, is the fact that the atmosphere’s uniform CO2 concentration is easy to work with – both in modelling and conceptually – but they should aquire humility before indulging their CO2 fetish and advancing their tenuous doomsday predictions given geoscience’s overwhelming ignorance about climate feedbacks."
Wow, that post is just so full of derp, that I am at a loss as to where to begin.
Let's see, paragraph 2, "Correlations are observed, but they do not prove causation... That is, "CO2 and climate temperature change show correlations, but not cause and effect."
Wow. OK, so I downloaded and read the linked PDF article. First-off, it is not published in a peer-reviewed journal, or even as a conference-proceedings article (which are typically not peer-reviewed). It was posted on his blog. Note that his title is "Former Professor," and not "Emeritus Professor" or similar; and at what university? The profile pic on his blog is of a young-ish guy. My gut feeling is that he either didn't make tenure, or, more likely, that he was just an adjunct prof. or lecturer to begin with, and is over-using this association to create a falsely impressive title. Also, this "article" is from 2011, so it's not relevant to this Slashdot thread about 2013 levels of CO2.
Academic dishonesty really pisses me off, so I will note here some of the deficiencies: He uses name-calling and polarizing language in what is purported to be an academic article. In the abstract alone, he says that he uses the "...simplest model possible..." The introduction is laced with more, such as "Physicists have largely abandoned their gadfly role..." He then goes on to call them careerists with no care for truth or science. It is no small wonder that he is clearly an outsider––he doesn't actually do careful studies of phenomena. He's simply a charlatan, and I am wasting my time here to out him as such.
He continues, in the abstract, with, "The double-layer atmosphere model with no free parameters provides:..." Really? His model has no free parameters? That is, it's not a model, but a defined-conclusion (spreadsheet) calculation. He refers to "...the textbook model..." Again, really?!? You claim to be a "former professor" yet you rail against "the textbook model?" What a sad argument to make.
The abstract also includes a line, "All the model predictions robustly follow from the straightforward underlying assumptions without any need for elaborate global circulation models." What?!? Is robustly a word? Your over-simplified model yields the "results" that you were looking for, so you find no need to validate your model? Come on! And what is with the overly complicated language? As Niels Bohr said, "If you can't explain your science to a barmaid, it probably isn't very good science." Or something to that effect.
Continuing, just in the abstract, the author concludes with a significant amount of name-calling (not tolerated in any respectable or even semi-respectable scientific publication): "I conclude with suggested implications regarding warming alarmism, errors by sceptics, research funding, and scientific ignorance regarding climate feedbacks."
Another aspect that sets off the bullshit-alarm of any practicing scientist is his introductory paragraphs. Read it for yourself, if you have time to waste. I am pissed-off that I wasted my time reading any of his crap. I want my time back!
Okay, oh God, what a piece of crap article. I cannot for the life of me get past even the introduction. The derp is just too strong.
Another big bullshit-alarm indicator––overly complicated words and phrases. It's intentionally unreadable in an attempt to cow readers into
At around 10,000 ppm or so CO2, humans begin to experience respiratory distress. At higher levels, they die.
Sure, they may die while being really high and happy on your potent bud, but they will die.
As I understand biology, all plants (and some algae, etc. that produce chlorophyll) remove CO2 from the atmosphere in the process. So, why is marijuana, in particular, the most prized solution? Sure there's also lotus, peyote, and salvia divinroum, and others, all of which are plants that can get you super-high.
I just don't understand the fixation on marijuana. Are you trying to save the planet by convincing everyone to grow marijuana, in particular, instead of, oh, I don't know jasmine bushes? They smell really awesome
kenh:And it accounts for respectively 37 per cent of all human-induced methane (23 times as warming as CO2), which is largely produced by the digestive system of ruminants, and 64 per cent of ammonia, which contributes significantly to acid rain.
While I think that your overall point regarding ruminants is valuable, I feel obligated to point out (as a scientist), that ammonia absolutely does not contribute to acid rain. Ammonia is a base; the nominal opposite of an acid.
I can't even remember how many angles I have used to try to explain this. Climate-change deniers are completely impossible to convince that the earth is not an infinite system.
This brings to mind my favorite George Orwell quote, from his book, "A Clergyman's Daughter:"
"She came up against it all day long--that vague, blank disbelief so common in illiterate people, against which all argument is powerless."
Sums it up for many contemporary public debates, don't you think?
It is tough to determine where to publish... It is in part the responsibility of the young publisher (scientist) to know the reputation of the journal(s) to which s/he publishes. Although there has indeed been a flood of brand-new and un-pedigreed online-only journals, it is really up to the researcher to decide where to publish. Indeed, there have existed for many years "vanity journals," and conference-"proceedings" journals, to which aspiring assistant Profs. can contribute, but which have impact factors of less than one.
Conference papers are one thing, but "real" publications are another thing entirely. Web-of-Science tries to explicitly avoid such gray-zone publications mentioned in a recent NYT article, and also, many top-tier journals do not consider "publication" in a conference proceedings to supersede, effectively, public dissemination of a work. That is, it doesn't count.
I can say, from the perspective of an early-career and young CV-builder, that it is very difficult to figure out which journals in one's particular field are preeminent and worthy of submission of good work, but also, which "outlets" are not worthy of disclosure of "new" work or results. To be safe, a lot of us youngsters just stick to APL and JAP, simply because we know that they are (a) reputable with reasonable IFs, and (b) because we know we can get good work published in them. Branching out to other journals is fraught with risks; publication-wise, it is a difficult lottery. But, as the NYT article puts it, and as anyone who has observed, for example, Elsevier's for-profit actions in publishing papers from vanity conferences, one can get just about anything into print, for the right price.
It is a significant risk, however, to publish in one of the new online-only journals. (What happens if they go bankrupt? Can you legally provide reprints?) The very real risk for anyone publishing in a for-profit online-only journal is, well, will your work be accessible in 10 years? 30 years? You grant a journal copyright when you publish, and in return, well, what do you get? Traditionally, you know that your work is in print in many scientific libraries across the world. But with an online-only and for-profit journal, you are granting them the same rights––are you guaranteed that your work will be accessible to all for the foreseeable future? No, you are not. When IP rights are in private control, they can change hands, at any time, as upon sale.
Long story short––The existing model of non-profits owning copyrights to half of scientists' work is the standard (odious as that may be), but, a move to for-profit and online-only journals will only exacerbate the situation. Your life's work could end up inaccessible to anyone, if a for-profit enterprise (like Elsevier) decides that making-available of copies of your work is not profitable. Remember, you grant the journal copyright... That is where these online-only, and for-profit journals are headed. This sort of thing has happened over and over again in the past, under copyright, with movies, scripts, musical recordings, etc. Do you want to put science under the same yoke of private ownership of dissemination?
Ask yourself: Should my work be made available for only 5 years? Or should it be made available in perpetuity to the readers of the journal to which I submit my work? Really, how valuable is your contribution? If in 50 years, there is someone with a question that can be answered by your work, should it not be available? (This is not fantasy. For example, space groups were fully developed 40 years before x-ray diffraction allowed the interpretation of crystal structures of materials based on diffraction-pattern symmetries.)
Do you want your discoveries either locked up in copyright limbo, or lost in a region of cyberspace gone fallow? No. Science is a progression, and should not be stunted by any potential lack of accessibility, short-term or long.
That is, OP, just agreeing with you that it's a problem, but one that hasn't found a solution yet.
Will RTFA in a moment, but here's a starter response:
We all know that an email is as secure a postcard. So, yeah, maybe one or two might be intercepted occasionally. But that does not lead logically to the expectation that someone intentionlly reading all of the thousands of emails I send a year is not a violation of the fourth Amendment (unreasonable search and seizure).
Organizational rot sets in when there is nothing really "new" or interesting for employees to do, little opportunity for promotion, all spread over a number of years. How could it not?
An easy and secure job sounds like an attractive thing on its face, but really, it's not, and often eventually turns into a "club." And it's boring.
Quote FTA, by a former launch-control officer, "Minuteman launch crews have long been marginalized and demoralized by the fact that the Air Force's culture and fast-track careers revolve around flying planes, not sitting in underground bunkers baby-sitting nuclear-armed missiles."
Spot-on, parent poster. It's all about control and squeezing the customers for more money.
If Adobe, or any other software companies, go to this model, I will simply refuse to "upgrade" as long as I can stand it. And, I suspect, by the time that I do need to "upgrade" (based not on new features but on OS compatibility), someone else will have entered the same market-space with a "boxed" product. I will switch over to that.
The root of this SAS and cloud-based nonsense is that many software applications have matured. There is no reason to buy the next version, because the apps already do what you need. Companies need revenue to survive. But, instead of entering a new market, or addressing a new need, they are trying to go to always-on internet and DRM'd versions of those self-same boxed products that many already own.
A business plan is typically a 10-page PPT presentation. Only ONE slide deals with the technology itself. Slides are:
* Market
* Product
* Customers
* Technology
* Development Plan
* Distribution Plan
* Team
* Competition
* Financial Projections
* Exit strategy
If you drone on about the specifics of the technology, they will get bored, and will think that you do not have interest in putting in the "other" work necessary to get a business off the ground.
Lastly, avoid VCs if you can. They care only about ROI and will be constantly breathing down your neck. Rather, get a few articles into trade mags if you can, then solicit big companies. Your best bet may be an exit strategy of "Exit upon sale" of the technology. The buyer may also hire you on for a while, but don't count on that lasting after you've spilled all of the beans.
And last-lastly---at a minimum, file a Provisional Patent with the USPTO. That protects you for up to a year, and costs like $75. A full patent is more like $15k.
And keep your secrets close to your chest. Tell people what it does, but not how it does it.
DISCLAIMER: I'm a small-business owner and patent holder.
Subby:...Don't miss out — make your summarization...
Not to be a pedant, but em-dashes are not offset from the clauses that they connect with spaces––there is no need. See Strunk & White, Chicago Manual of Style, or even just your handy dictionary.
An em-dash (––) is made up of two conjoined en-dashes (–).
I have held AAPL for a long time, and have (on paper) benefitted from their meteoric stock-price rise.
I also own GE. Staid, solid, consistent. Their stock price does not change much, but they do pay a dividend every quarter.
AAPL is (possibly) at a point where they have to decide which path they choose to take. They can pay huge dividends and have a stable stock price, or they can "act like a startup," as they have recently, and invade new markets that they consider stagnant, and can potentially have a significant impact in, based on their core competencies (yuk, market-speak) of refining user interfaces to their utmost simplicity, thereby upsetting the sleepy corps that had previously dominated that market. We shall see.
Also, I meant that whoever provided LinkedIn with that information was possibly in violation. Entities that know the connection are my insurer, the psychiatrist, and other medical professionals, any of which would have been in violation of HIPAA for this. Three other entities, my bank, cell provider, and email provider, would of course not be subject to such constraints. Oh, some attorneys knew also, but no public filings; private settlement.
Web-footprints seem doubtful in this case. I doubt the psychiatrist even has a web site, and I was referred verbally by someone in the same building.
I've had a LinkedIn account for a decade or so. During most of that time, it was just a place to post my CV details, and to "link" to other professionals that I know. No longer.
Now, when I go to LinkedIn, they suggest numerous people as "People You May Know." Fine, let's take a look:
* my psychiatrist (who even knows that I have one!?!)
* the guy who painted my condo five years ago
* an ex-roommate from 11 years ago
* an acupuncturist who I used three times, in another city, eight years ago
* a casual acquaintance from 10 years ago (who may have sent me an invite)
* someone whose only connection to me is a one-time dance, and is a "FB friend." No emails between us
* a guy I shared an office with, but who was a jerk, so we never exchanged emails
* a guy who formerly lived in my condo complex
* a guy who was the grad-school advisor of a former workplace colleague, but whom I never socialized with
* a researcher at another lab, who I have only ever talked to once, and have never emailed
* a years-ago dance instructor whom I only ever contacted twice, via phone
* a guy whom I co-authored a single scientific paper with years ago, and emailed only once
* various students who have taken my courses
* a woman who worked at the same company I worked at, but whom I never had an email contact with (outside of the company's proprietary and encrypted Lotus Notes system)
* a former program manager at a lab I formerly worked at, 10 years ago, whom I only interacted with in person (no email)
* another guy I co-authored a journal article with, but never contacted by email outside my former employer's encrypted LotusNotes email system
* my former accountant
* a former frat brother, from 15 years ago, whom I have never emailed
* various program managers at national funding agencies whom I have contacted in the past via phone/email
* several former colleagues that I never emailed, but had only verbal contact with, from a lab 12 years ago
* a professor whom I emailed only once, 12 years ago regarding a postdoc position, but never met
* the son of a former colleague, who I ever only heard about in lunch conversation, and never interacted with
* a roommate from 10 years ago
* a prof I took an undergrad course from 19 years ago
* lots of profs and researchers whom I know professionally and personally, but whom I have never emailed
* plus lots of false hits...
Very creepy, and really, in a couple of cases violating HIPPA regulations through their disclosure of who-knows-whom.
Where are they mining? People's email address books, certainly. But probably also my bank, author lists on publications, speaker lists at conferences, and perhaps people who simply look up my profile.
Too creepy. I will soon cancel my LinkedIn account, and just make a website bearing my name (I already own the domain), so that people can find me without all of this creepy gray-zone crap.
From what I've read of reports (caveat emptor), the fire started near an anhydrous ammonia tank. OK, bad, but from early reports it seems to have been worse.
Reportedly, there was a rail-car tanker full of fuming nitric acid nearby. A clear safety violation, but anyways...
Anhydrous ammonia is a strong base. It also, like any water-soluble chemical, has a certain heat of solution, in this case generating heat. So, spraying water on a fire that involves leaking anhydrous ammonia will generate more heat. Not good, but it gets worse. Apparently, from preliminary reports, there was a rail-car tanker full of fuming nitric acid nearby. That is a no-no, because fuming nitric is a strong acid. Aside from the heat of solution, strong acids react strongly with strong bases, often generating lost of heat, and gaseous byproducts such as hydrogen gas. And, oh, furthermore, fuming nitric acid is also a strong oxidizer.
To sum up this early-reported scenario, which may or may not be the full story: Anhydrous ammonia (NH3) was stored in close proximity with fuming nitric acid (HNO3). There was a fire of some sort. First-responders sprayed water onto this fire. What may have happened next was that the fire got the ammonia hot enough to possibly dissociate and produce H2, or perhaps the vessel just leaked. The heat of the fire eventually ruptured the nearby tanker car of fuming nitric acid, thus releasing it. Aside from the heat of solution, the ammonia and nitric acid could have come into contact. Strong base + strong acid = heat, hydrogen gas, and unhappy things. Add to that the strong oxidizing capability of fuming nitric acid, and you have: fuel + oxidizer + heat = BOOM.
That's just one possible chemical scenario that could have led to this tragedy.
The plant should have had very firm procedures for dealing with fires, separating reactive pairs of chemicals, and for dealing with leaks of the various chemicals that they stored in large containers. It seems, from these early reports, that they did not.
These days, I have given up my mouse almost entirely––for a trackpad.
I now use only two fingers to interact with all the usual types of software. Additionally, I am now quite fast with Photoshop, Google Sketchup, Power Point (ugh), various games, and advanced scientific software like LabView (a graphical programming language). All with two fingers. The wrist is only involved in moving my hand from the keyboard to the very close-by trackpad (well, really it's more of a shoulder motion, but a short distance).
Anyone thinking that we are headed towards a "Minority Report"-type of interface is simply going in the wrong direction. Less physical exertion, not more.
While I appreciate what was said in the video, I can't imagine that I'd ever prefer leap motion, or even touch screens, over a mouse. It all boils down to the physical exertion of lifting my arm to perform input vs resting my arm on a desk and lightly moving my wrist. I can overcome intuitive input by learning to use a less intuitive system, but I will never overcome more physically exertive systems being more physically exertive.
I recall hearing that Chefs learn to manipulate a whisk with their wrist because the smaller muscles are less tiring in the long run, even though it's more natural to want to use your shoulder and arm to perform the action. This seems to be analogous to these new input styles.
Precisely. Well said.
I will give you a tip. Buy a "low-profile" mouse instead of those big-humped things that come with most machines. Your forearm will then be able to rest on the desk. Thus, instead of using your wrist muscles, you will only need to use your fingers muscles to mouse. That is, it will be even less physically exertive.
If you do this, you will eventually feel a need to turn the sensitivity of the mouse up, due to the decreased effort, and will end up never really using your wrist muscles for mousing again. Bonus: no carpal tunnel.
Fingers are designed for fine movement and control. The wrist, not so much.
You are lucky that you didn't buy a new machine with the intention of wiping Win 8 and installing 7.
My department accidentally bought two lab computers with Win 8. My TA must have spent days trying to get 7 to install. I don't know the particulars, but MS made it extremely difficult to downgrade.
I now think that ultimately, a unified interface is where we'll have to go, not necessarily because of today's corporate cost-cutting, but to reduce the learning curve as our most common devices become integrated. When I'm 85, I don't want to have to learn seven different UIs to make a pot of coffee, check my email, and get a weather forecast.
Give an iPad to a child and you will see what the learning curve is––practically zero.
Sit them in front of a command line, and it might take them a little longer, despite the immense power of a shell. That power will be lost in the "unified interface" movement, along with a lot of productivity.
Slashdot Mirror
mbeckman: ..."What emboldens warmist scientists and modellers, beyond institutional backing and the advantages of groupthink, is the fact that the atmosphere’s uniform CO2 concentration is easy to work with – both in modelling and conceptually – but they should aquire humility before indulging their CO2 fetish and advancing their tenuous doomsday predictions given geoscience’s overwhelming ignorance about climate feedbacks."
Wow, that post is just so full of derp, that I am at a loss as to where to begin.
Let's see, paragraph 2, "Correlations are observed, but they do not prove causation... That is, "CO2 and climate temperature change show correlations, but not cause and effect."
Wow. OK, so I downloaded and read the linked PDF article. First-off, it is not published in a peer-reviewed journal, or even as a conference-proceedings article (which are typically not peer-reviewed). It was posted on his blog. Note that his title is "Former Professor," and not "Emeritus Professor" or similar; and at what university? The profile pic on his blog is of a young-ish guy. My gut feeling is that he either didn't make tenure, or, more likely, that he was just an adjunct prof. or lecturer to begin with, and is over-using this association to create a falsely impressive title. Also, this "article" is from 2011, so it's not relevant to this Slashdot thread about 2013 levels of CO2.
Academic dishonesty really pisses me off, so I will note here some of the deficiencies: He uses name-calling and polarizing language in what is purported to be an academic article. In the abstract alone, he says that he uses the "...simplest model possible..." The introduction is laced with more, such as "Physicists have largely abandoned their gadfly role..." He then goes on to call them careerists with no care for truth or science. It is no small wonder that he is clearly an outsider––he doesn't actually do careful studies of phenomena. He's simply a charlatan, and I am wasting my time here to out him as such.
He continues, in the abstract, with, "The double-layer atmosphere model with no free parameters provides:..." Really? His model has no free parameters? That is, it's not a model, but a defined-conclusion (spreadsheet) calculation. He refers to "...the textbook model..." Again, really?!? You claim to be a "former professor" yet you rail against "the textbook model?" What a sad argument to make.
The abstract also includes a line, "All the model predictions robustly follow from the straightforward underlying assumptions without any need for elaborate global circulation models." What?!? Is robustly a word? Your over-simplified model yields the "results" that you were looking for, so you find no need to validate your model? Come on! And what is with the overly complicated language? As Niels Bohr said, "If you can't explain your science to a barmaid, it probably isn't very good science." Or something to that effect.
Continuing, just in the abstract, the author concludes with a significant amount of name-calling (not tolerated in any respectable or even semi-respectable scientific publication): "I conclude with suggested implications regarding warming alarmism, errors by sceptics, research funding, and scientific ignorance regarding climate feedbacks."
Another aspect that sets off the bullshit-alarm of any practicing scientist is his introductory paragraphs. Read it for yourself, if you have time to waste. I am pissed-off that I wasted my time reading any of his crap. I want my time back!
Okay, oh God, what a piece of crap article. I cannot for the life of me get past even the introduction. The derp is just too strong.
Another big bullshit-alarm indicator––overly complicated words and phrases. It's intentionally unreadable in an attempt to cow readers into
Ha. Oh, wow.
One little missing "that," and the meaning of the entire sentence changes.
Dear Readers: Scientists don't take sides; we stake out a position and hold it. Also, we are human, just like you.
LOL.
At around 10,000 ppm or so CO2, humans begin to experience respiratory distress. At higher levels, they die.
Sure, they may die while being really high and happy on your potent bud, but they will die.
As I understand biology, all plants (and some algae, etc. that produce chlorophyll) remove CO2 from the atmosphere in the process. So, why is marijuana, in particular, the most prized solution? Sure there's also lotus, peyote, and salvia divinroum, and others, all of which are plants that can get you super-high.
I just don't understand the fixation on marijuana. Are you trying to save the planet by convincing everyone to grow marijuana, in particular, instead of, oh, I don't know jasmine bushes? They smell really awesome
kenh: And it accounts for respectively 37 per cent of all human-induced methane (23 times as warming as CO2), which is largely produced by the digestive system of ruminants, and 64 per cent of ammonia, which contributes significantly to acid rain.
While I think that your overall point regarding ruminants is valuable, I feel obligated to point out (as a scientist), that ammonia absolutely does not contribute to acid rain. Ammonia is a base; the nominal opposite of an acid.
I can't even remember how many angles I have used to try to explain this. Climate-change deniers are completely impossible to convince that the earth is not an infinite system.
This brings to mind my favorite George Orwell quote, from his book, "A Clergyman's Daughter:"
"She came up against it all day long--that vague, blank disbelief so common in illiterate people, against which all argument is powerless."
Sums it up for many contemporary public debates, don't you think?
PeterM: I think $0.25 per page up to a maximum of $5 for an article is pretty reasonable, how about you?
That's much better than the $40 I have paid to read my own articles in an occasional time-pinch.
NYT article about "scientific-article SPAM," which is a related topic:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/08/health/for-scientists-an-exploding-world-of-pseudo-academia.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
It is tough to determine where to publish... It is in part the responsibility of the young publisher (scientist) to know the reputation of the journal(s) to which s/he publishes. Although there has indeed been a flood of brand-new and un-pedigreed online-only journals, it is really up to the researcher to decide where to publish. Indeed, there have existed for many years "vanity journals," and conference-"proceedings" journals, to which aspiring assistant Profs. can contribute, but which have impact factors of less than one.
Conference papers are one thing, but "real" publications are another thing entirely. Web-of-Science tries to explicitly avoid such gray-zone publications mentioned in a recent NYT article, and also, many top-tier journals do not consider "publication" in a conference proceedings to supersede, effectively, public dissemination of a work. That is, it doesn't count.
I can say, from the perspective of an early-career and young CV-builder, that it is very difficult to figure out which journals in one's particular field are preeminent and worthy of submission of good work, but also, which "outlets" are not worthy of disclosure of "new" work or results. To be safe, a lot of us youngsters just stick to APL and JAP, simply because we know that they are (a) reputable with reasonable IFs, and (b) because we know we can get good work published in them. Branching out to other journals is fraught with risks; publication-wise, it is a difficult lottery. But, as the NYT article puts it, and as anyone who has observed, for example, Elsevier's for-profit actions in publishing papers from vanity conferences, one can get just about anything into print, for the right price.
It is a significant risk, however, to publish in one of the new online-only journals. (What happens if they go bankrupt? Can you legally provide reprints?) The very real risk for anyone publishing in a for-profit online-only journal is, well, will your work be accessible in 10 years? 30 years? You grant a journal copyright when you publish, and in return, well, what do you get? Traditionally, you know that your work is in print in many scientific libraries across the world. But with an online-only and for-profit journal, you are granting them the same rights––are you guaranteed that your work will be accessible to all for the foreseeable future? No, you are not. When IP rights are in private control, they can change hands, at any time, as upon sale.
Long story short––The existing model of non-profits owning copyrights to half of scientists' work is the standard (odious as that may be), but, a move to for-profit and online-only journals will only exacerbate the situation. Your life's work could end up inaccessible to anyone, if a for-profit enterprise (like Elsevier) decides that making-available of copies of your work is not profitable. Remember, you grant the journal copyright... That is where these online-only, and for-profit journals are headed. This sort of thing has happened over and over again in the past, under copyright, with movies, scripts, musical recordings, etc. Do you want to put science under the same yoke of private ownership of dissemination?
Ask yourself: Should my work be made available for only 5 years? Or should it be made available in perpetuity to the readers of the journal to which I submit my work? Really, how valuable is your contribution? If in 50 years, there is someone with a question that can be answered by your work, should it not be available? (This is not fantasy. For example, space groups were fully developed 40 years before x-ray diffraction allowed the interpretation of crystal structures of materials based on diffraction-pattern symmetries.)
Do you want your discoveries either locked up in copyright limbo, or lost in a region of cyberspace gone fallow? No. Science is a progression, and should not be stunted by any potential lack of accessibility, short-term or long.
That is, OP, just agreeing with you that it's a problem, but one that hasn't found a solution yet.
Without a warrant or similar judge-issued order, that is.
Will RTFA in a moment, but here's a starter response:
We all know that an email is as secure a postcard. So, yeah, maybe one or two might be intercepted occasionally. But that does not lead logically to the expectation that someone intentionlly reading all of the thousands of emails I send a year is not a violation of the fourth Amendment (unreasonable search and seizure).
Organizational rot sets in when there is nothing really "new" or interesting for employees to do, little opportunity for promotion, all spread over a number of years. How could it not?
An easy and secure job sounds like an attractive thing on its face, but really, it's not, and often eventually turns into a "club." And it's boring.
Quote FTA, by a former launch-control officer, "Minuteman launch crews have long been marginalized and demoralized by the fact that the Air Force's culture and fast-track careers revolve around flying planes, not sitting in underground bunkers baby-sitting nuclear-armed missiles."
But how reliable are they?
Spot-on, parent poster. It's all about control and squeezing the customers for more money.
If Adobe, or any other software companies, go to this model, I will simply refuse to "upgrade" as long as I can stand it. And, I suspect, by the time that I do need to "upgrade" (based not on new features but on OS compatibility), someone else will have entered the same market-space with a "boxed" product. I will switch over to that.
The root of this SAS and cloud-based nonsense is that many software applications have matured. There is no reason to buy the next version, because the apps already do what you need. Companies need revenue to survive. But, instead of entering a new market, or addressing a new need, they are trying to go to always-on internet and DRM'd versions of those self-same boxed products that many already own.
A business plan is typically a 10-page PPT presentation. Only ONE slide deals with the technology itself. Slides are:
* Market
* Product
* Customers
* Technology
* Development Plan
* Distribution Plan
* Team
* Competition
* Financial Projections
* Exit strategy
If you drone on about the specifics of the technology, they will get bored, and will think that you do not have interest in putting in the "other" work necessary to get a business off the ground.
Lastly, avoid VCs if you can. They care only about ROI and will be constantly breathing down your neck. Rather, get a few articles into trade mags if you can, then solicit big companies. Your best bet may be an exit strategy of "Exit upon sale" of the technology. The buyer may also hire you on for a while, but don't count on that lasting after you've spilled all of the beans.
And last-lastly---at a minimum, file a Provisional Patent with the USPTO. That protects you for up to a year, and costs like $75. A full patent is more like $15k.
And keep your secrets close to your chest. Tell people what it does, but not how it does it.
DISCLAIMER: I'm a small-business owner and patent holder.
Sounds like a cry of sour grapes on BlackBerry's part.
Whaa.
Subby: ...Don't miss out — make your summarization...
Not to be a pedant, but em-dashes are not offset from the clauses that they connect with spaces––there is no need. See Strunk & White, Chicago Manual of Style, or even just your handy dictionary.
An em-dash (––) is made up of two conjoined en-dashes (–).
I have held AAPL for a long time, and have (on paper) benefitted from their meteoric stock-price rise.
I also own GE. Staid, solid, consistent. Their stock price does not change much, but they do pay a dividend every quarter.
AAPL is (possibly) at a point where they have to decide which path they choose to take. They can pay huge dividends and have a stable stock price, or they can "act like a startup," as they have recently, and invade new markets that they consider stagnant, and can potentially have a significant impact in, based on their core competencies (yuk, market-speak) of refining user interfaces to their utmost simplicity, thereby upsetting the sleepy corps that had previously dominated that market. We shall see.
Yes, I meant HIPAA.
Also, I meant that whoever provided LinkedIn with that information was possibly in violation. Entities that know the connection are my insurer, the psychiatrist, and other medical professionals, any of which would have been in violation of HIPAA for this. Three other entities, my bank, cell provider, and email provider, would of course not be subject to such constraints. Oh, some attorneys knew also, but no public filings; private settlement.
Web-footprints seem doubtful in this case. I doubt the psychiatrist even has a web site, and I was referred verbally by someone in the same building.
Ah well.
I've had a LinkedIn account for a decade or so. During most of that time, it was just a place to post my CV details, and to "link" to other professionals that I know. No longer.
Now, when I go to LinkedIn, they suggest numerous people as "People You May Know." Fine, let's take a look:
* my psychiatrist (who even knows that I have one!?!)
* the guy who painted my condo five years ago
* an ex-roommate from 11 years ago
* an acupuncturist who I used three times, in another city, eight years ago
* a casual acquaintance from 10 years ago (who may have sent me an invite)
* someone whose only connection to me is a one-time dance, and is a "FB friend." No emails between us
* a guy I shared an office with, but who was a jerk, so we never exchanged emails
* a guy who formerly lived in my condo complex
* a guy who was the grad-school advisor of a former workplace colleague, but whom I never socialized with
* a researcher at another lab, who I have only ever talked to once, and have never emailed
* a years-ago dance instructor whom I only ever contacted twice, via phone
* a guy whom I co-authored a single scientific paper with years ago, and emailed only once
* various students who have taken my courses
* a woman who worked at the same company I worked at, but whom I never had an email contact with (outside of the company's proprietary and encrypted Lotus Notes system)
* a former program manager at a lab I formerly worked at, 10 years ago, whom I only interacted with in person (no email)
* another guy I co-authored a journal article with, but never contacted by email outside my former employer's encrypted LotusNotes email system
* my former accountant
* a former frat brother, from 15 years ago, whom I have never emailed
* various program managers at national funding agencies whom I have contacted in the past via phone/email
* several former colleagues that I never emailed, but had only verbal contact with, from a lab 12 years ago
* a professor whom I emailed only once, 12 years ago regarding a postdoc position, but never met
* the son of a former colleague, who I ever only heard about in lunch conversation, and never interacted with
* a roommate from 10 years ago
* a prof I took an undergrad course from 19 years ago
* lots of profs and researchers whom I know professionally and personally, but whom I have never emailed
* plus lots of false hits...
Very creepy, and really, in a couple of cases violating HIPPA regulations through their disclosure of who-knows-whom.
Where are they mining? People's email address books, certainly. But probably also my bank, author lists on publications, speaker lists at conferences, and perhaps people who simply look up my profile.
Too creepy. I will soon cancel my LinkedIn account, and just make a website bearing my name (I already own the domain), so that people can find me without all of this creepy gray-zone crap.
From what I've read of reports (caveat emptor), the fire started near an anhydrous ammonia tank. OK, bad, but from early reports it seems to have been worse.
Reportedly, there was a rail-car tanker full of fuming nitric acid nearby. A clear safety violation, but anyways...
Anhydrous ammonia is a strong base. It also, like any water-soluble chemical, has a certain heat of solution, in this case generating heat. So, spraying water on a fire that involves leaking anhydrous ammonia will generate more heat. Not good, but it gets worse. Apparently, from preliminary reports, there was a rail-car tanker full of fuming nitric acid nearby. That is a no-no, because fuming nitric is a strong acid. Aside from the heat of solution, strong acids react strongly with strong bases, often generating lost of heat, and gaseous byproducts such as hydrogen gas. And, oh, furthermore, fuming nitric acid is also a strong oxidizer.
To sum up this early-reported scenario, which may or may not be the full story: Anhydrous ammonia (NH3) was stored in close proximity with fuming nitric acid (HNO3). There was a fire of some sort. First-responders sprayed water onto this fire. What may have happened next was that the fire got the ammonia hot enough to possibly dissociate and produce H2, or perhaps the vessel just leaked. The heat of the fire eventually ruptured the nearby tanker car of fuming nitric acid, thus releasing it. Aside from the heat of solution, the ammonia and nitric acid could have come into contact. Strong base + strong acid = heat, hydrogen gas, and unhappy things. Add to that the strong oxidizing capability of fuming nitric acid, and you have: fuel + oxidizer + heat = BOOM.
That's just one possible chemical scenario that could have led to this tragedy.
The plant should have had very firm procedures for dealing with fires, separating reactive pairs of chemicals, and for dealing with leaks of the various chemicals that they stored in large containers. It seems, from these early reports, that they did not.
Sorry to double-post...
These days, I have given up my mouse almost entirely––for a trackpad.
I now use only two fingers to interact with all the usual types of software. Additionally, I am now quite fast with Photoshop, Google Sketchup, Power Point (ugh), various games, and advanced scientific software like LabView (a graphical programming language). All with two fingers. The wrist is only involved in moving my hand from the keyboard to the very close-by trackpad (well, really it's more of a shoulder motion, but a short distance).
Anyone thinking that we are headed towards a "Minority Report"-type of interface is simply going in the wrong direction. Less physical exertion, not more.
While I appreciate what was said in the video, I can't imagine that I'd ever prefer leap motion, or even touch screens, over a mouse. It all boils down to the physical exertion of lifting my arm to perform input vs resting my arm on a desk and lightly moving my wrist. I can overcome intuitive input by learning to use a less intuitive system, but I will never overcome more physically exertive systems being more physically exertive. I recall hearing that Chefs learn to manipulate a whisk with their wrist because the smaller muscles are less tiring in the long run, even though it's more natural to want to use your shoulder and arm to perform the action. This seems to be analogous to these new input styles.
Precisely. Well said.
I will give you a tip. Buy a "low-profile" mouse instead of those big-humped things that come with most machines. Your forearm will then be able to rest on the desk. Thus, instead of using your wrist muscles, you will only need to use your fingers muscles to mouse. That is, it will be even less physically exertive.
If you do this, you will eventually feel a need to turn the sensitivity of the mouse up, due to the decreased effort, and will end up never really using your wrist muscles for mousing again. Bonus: no carpal tunnel.
Fingers are designed for fine movement and control. The wrist, not so much.
Harper's
The Atlantic
Lapham's Quarterly
Foreign Affairs (used to)
A few trade magazines
I read them in the hot tub, on travel, in bed.
No worries if they get wet, or lost, or if you fall asleep while reading them.
Most also come with full access to their web site, which often includes access to their entire back-catalog!
You are lucky that you didn't buy a new machine with the intention of wiping Win 8 and installing 7.
My department accidentally bought two lab computers with Win 8. My TA must have spent days trying to get 7 to install. I don't know the particulars, but MS made it extremely difficult to downgrade.
I now think that ultimately, a unified interface is where we'll have to go, not necessarily because of today's corporate cost-cutting, but to reduce the learning curve as our most common devices become integrated. When I'm 85, I don't want to have to learn seven different UIs to make a pot of coffee, check my email, and get a weather forecast.
Give an iPad to a child and you will see what the learning curve is––practically zero.
Sit them in front of a command line, and it might take them a little longer, despite the immense power of a shell. That power will be lost in the "unified interface" movement, along with a lot of productivity.