"Where to put that waste where it will be safe for 10,000 years of so is the difficult problem."
No, it's a political problem. The 10,000 year number is a red herring; if we were to reprocess and use the waste we wouldn't NEED to search for a way to keep the Eloi fat, dumb, and tasty.
You would need to build the solar collection portion of the plant over twice as large as the generator capacity dictates, because you only have 12 hours to collect the BTU's you need for all 24. That's also twice the land.
Maybe it's feasible, but the existing systems are mostly small - about 50MW. A baseload powerplant in the US is generally over 500MW - nukes go up to 1250. And like the nuclear industry found out, you can't just "scale up" a small design by an order of magnitude without problems.
Oh, yeah - then there's the 'West Coast to East Coast" thing - which our current grid can't do.
I have read of that model, although perhaps not that paper per se. Re-read my post - I didn't deny that wind was useful, only that it could not be dropped neatly into our existing grid and distribution models. This paper reiterates that - sure, wind can work - as long as you install an entirely new grid and control system to go with it!
For that matter, the OP took the position that wind and solar were peak load sources. That is patently incorrect - the model you cite shows wind as a replacement for baseload. The root of the distinction between peak and baseline generation is that you can turn peaking plants of and off when it is needed. Sure, you could handle that peak by increasing the base load capacity and then just under-loading it most of the time, but that's hugely inefficient. Wind and solar simply don't fit neatly into the curent power grid. That's not a condemnation, but a recognition that more has to change than "Just build windmills."
"In the same way that Walmart comes into a town and destroys local businesses, Google can enter into an industry/sector and destroy most of the competition overnight by giving an application away for free. Who is going to pay $100 for a Maps Application now (or more for a hardware device) when they can just download one for free.
Isn't this the same type of stuff we accused Microsoft of doing years ago? Yup, Walmart, I mean Google strikes again. Pray whatever industry you're in Google doesn't decide to suddenly release a free product."
Yeah, and then they jack up prices once the competition is gone!
Wait - they don't do that? They keep their prices low? Well, wtf?
There are plenty of reasons to dislike Walmart, but the "destroy competition" is the weakest one. The reason that is generally viewed as bad is that it has historically led to price increases, but that hasn't yet happened with Walmart. Same as Google.
The difference between them and MS is that, once MS had wiped out Netscape, it could divert resources away from browser development, and left us with IE6 for years. The consumer did not benefit. One might argue that the Wal-Mart/Google model is bad on a macroeconomic scale, but certainly not at the consumer level.
"Wind and solar are both geared to address peak. "
Bullshit - they aren't "geared" toward anything. Wind and solar don't work like that - the grid operators cannot simply turn on the wind or the sun. And that level of control is necessary for how we run our grid presently. Baseline is always on, and peak is on when dictated by demand, NOT availability. Solar is an especially good example of this - peak generating hours in many parts of the country occur in early evening in the summer, as people get home from work, turn on lights, cook, and the AC labors to take care of the load. But that's when your solar generation is going down. So you still need to fire up peaking plants to meet demand.
I'm not saying that wind and solar don't have their place, only that they don't drop as neatly into the electrical supply system as some would wish.
"So here is what I think Lee might ask today: why do people take pleasure in pretending (virtually) to kill innocent civilians? Or kill in general? Or eat people, as someone mentioned in Prototype (never played it)?"
I think he'd be struck by cognitive dissonance. The existence of our society where relatively few people have ACTUALLY been involved with violence is unprecedented. In earlier times, children knew exactly what death looked like - the boys hunted and the girls helped slaughter the chickens (note the same can be said of sex as well - no one needs to tell a farm kid about the birds and the bees when there's the pigs and sheep doin' it right there). So the idea that there are people who have made it to adulthood without seeing anything killed in real life (other than bugs) would be inconceivable. So I imagine the idea of those same people looking at *simulated* death would be just as foreign.
Whoops - I started thinking of the French retreating toward the west, then changed the wording to "looking" but forgot the change in direction. Just another dumb American who doesn't know his geography, I guess.
"This mode of looking at religion fails, because it assumes that religious people are mindless drones who will do whatever their priest tells them to do."
You've pegged the OP, but not the way you might think. The more I hear people being called "mindless drones" or other dismissive labels, the more I believe that the speaker is projecting his own fears and insecurities. Some people, afraid of being discovered to be unoriginal, or uninventive, or (God forbid) ordinary, react by shouting as loud as they can "Look at how THOSE people are!" and simultaneously whisper "and please don't look at how I am." I think it's the inverse of the body-modification crowd - people who feel ordinary, so they make changes to their outward appearance to make themselves "different".
First, it is implying that the H1N1 virus is going to pick up during the flu season. There's no reason whatsoever to believe that this is the case. The flu season typically does follow certain seasonal trends, but that's not true for new strains.
Second, the flu season normally lasts about five months, so if it dies out on schedule, it will have killed about half again more kids than the normal seasonal flu. And probably far fewer people over 30."
I believe it is you who are being disingenuous. He wasn't implying that H1N1 will "pick up", i.e. increase in occurrence. He was simply pointing out that we are seeing deaths from H1N1 outside of the timeframe that is normally associated with seasonal flu. By inference then we can conclude that it is somehow different than regular seasonal flu. And it will likely kill more people, in total, than seasonal flu, since it has had a head start. H1N1
That being said, there is EVERY reason to believe that H1N1 will "pick up" throughout the normal flu season. That is because primary difference between this strain of H1N1 and the regular seasonal flu is that H1N1 has a substantially higher temperature tolerance than regular flu. Flu viruses are very sensitive to temperature in vitro - the difference of a few degrees means that the flu virus can survive for weeks on a surface vs. hours. So the reason why we are seeing H1N1 so early in the season is that it can survive the warmer environmental temperatures better. However, that does NOT mean that cooler temps are detrimental - it lasts just fine when it gets cooler. Now add to that the general decrease in health and immune system function during the cooler months, we certainly could expect more people to be infected than currently, and that they will have statistically worse outcomes.
This ties into your second point. You are confusing the "epidemic cycle" timeline with the flu season. Flu season is 5 months long solely due to environmental temperatures - they are the 5 coldest months, which makes the virus easier to transmit via environmental surfaces. That's it. Since we already know that H1N1 has a higher temperature tolerance, there is no reason whatsoever to assume that it will have a 5 month "duration". Given the way it's behaved so far, it's more like 10 months - September to June.
That being said, THIS DOES NOT MEAN IT'S 1918! But to ignore the fact that H1N1 is substantially different than regular seasonal flu is whistling in the wind. You yourself acknowledge that it has a different pattern of morbidity: "it will have killed about half again more kids than the normal seasonal flu. And probably far fewer people over 30." And the virus, on a statistical basis, is much more contagious than seasonal flu, simply by the fact that it stays in the environment longer. These facts are NOT controversial. So why does simply stating them get you in a tizzy?
There's another thing to consider. H1N1 appears to be a "mild" pandemic. Great. But the fact that it stays in the environment for so long, and so extends it's "season", there is a substantially higher risk that people will become infected with H1N1 and another strain simultaneously. This has the potential to be a Very Bad Thing. Different strains of virus can swap genetic material in that situation. Which brings us back to the previous flu scare, H5N1. Except that it isn't "previous" in an epidemiological sense - it's still chugging along. H5N1, which has a VERY high case fatality rate, hasn't gone pandemic because the virus hasn't evolved to allow easy human-human transmission. So we've dodged that bullet. But what happens if someone gets infected with H1N1 and H5N1 simultaneously? There is the potential for the viruses to swap genetic material. One result would be a virus with the CFR of Swine Flu and the transmissibility of Bird flu. Which may well have occurred already, because such a viral strain would immediately die o
"So there's a semiconductor executive that is talking about classified information in an interview? His/Her clearance should be revoked, at least temporarily, until an investigation can be performed to determine whether any laws were broken, and how long the executive should serve."
Unless he was asked to "confirm" it by US intelligence as part of a cover story for the REAL reason the Isrealis were able to take out the systems.
I think it's valuable to point out that, at least where small arms are concerned, the US military is quite aware of that. While many foreign designs have been adopted, the companies are required to establish production facilities in the US.
Of course not. There are no "plans" to invade France - we just show up with guns and the French Army surrenders. Although they we might have to tap them on the shoulder to get their attention - they've always previously surrendered while facing west.
And for those who would draw a negative example with Iraq, I'd point out that the likelihood of developing suicide bombers from the native French population is, well, nil.
Here's another explanation - it's a red herring. By floating this story, you kill 2 birds:
1) It "explains" the lack of Syrian response in a way that maintains security on the real capabilities of Israeli jamming, and
2) It sends foreign powers on a wild goose chase, spending resources trying to root out "kill switches" that aren't there. This takes away from resources that could be spent improving the system's ability to see through jamming.
The elegance is that it has JUST enough plausibility that it can't be ignored, due to the (now) well publicized Soviet gas pumping station sabotage.
"Consolidation" would have made sense - except nothing was consolidated. Consolidation implies an increase in efficiencies by removing duplicate functions. The creation of DHS did nothing of the sort - it simply re-drew the org chat and made a bunch of agencies report to a totally new layer of management. Basically, they added all of the administrative overhead of a new cabinet level department without a corresponding increase in actual tasks performed.
"If you are causing a domestic panic and threatening to not only revoke many of the liberties outlined in the Bill of Rights, but also threatening to shut down communication lines, funneling billions into lobbying interests, while using fear tactics surrounding an illness that I would best describe my first-hand experience as a "laughably mild cold, without the annoyance of a stuffy nose" you're not supporting terrorism, you are practicing the definition of it."
Let's see: 1) 9 year old son, tested positive for swine flu, puked all day, down with the squirts the next, right as rain the third. So I agree with you 100% 2) Former coworker, tested positive for swine flu 3 weeks ago, was out of work in bed for a week and still feels like crap. So I think you are 100% wrong.
Oh, wait - maybe I should make my opinions on DATA, and not anecdote.
"They operate like a business, owning land, stock, collecting money for services etc. They make a profit on a lot of these activities just like a business, why shouldn't they pay taxes like everyone else? "
If that is your criteria, then NOTHING would be tax exempt. If that's your point, ok, but don't kame out like the Catholic Church or other denominations are special in that regard.
"Sonny Bono, Scientologist and Senator, not only supported the Mickey Mouse Protection Act which extended copyright terms to 75 years plus the life of the creator, he got the damn bill named after itself. "
A quibble - Sonny Bono was dead (skiing accident) when the law was passed. They named it after him in memorial.
That doesn't make it a good law, or him a good legislator, but it is the truth.
"The Roman Catholic Church is one of the world's largest real estate companies and source of crazy statements by The Pope."
2 items: 1) your link points to a site regarding the LDS church, aka the Mormons which, last I checked, have nothing to do with the Roman Catholic Church 2) A lot of what churches do is legal under another part of the code cited.
"It is a government run agency. It will only become a problem when the senator who is chairman of some committee was told he couldn't bring his laptop as carry on, and it gets stolen as a checked item."
You have a fundamental misunderstanding of how it works. Said senator would not get the law changed; he would simply make sure that he got a special exception from complying with the law.
Example - when Ted Kennedy got held up at an airport for his name being on the no-fly list, the system didn't get changed. The list just had an asterisk added at the name "Kennedy" that said " *does not apply to the fat drunk claiming to be a Senator - he really is one."
Slashdot Mirror
"Where to put that waste where it will be safe for 10,000 years of so is the difficult problem."
No, it's a political problem. The 10,000 year number is a red herring; if we were to reprocess and use the waste we wouldn't NEED to search for a way to keep the Eloi fat, dumb, and tasty.
"and oil,coal,nuclear ... WILL get more expensive. Guaranteed.)"
And wind and solar won't? The laws of supply and demand still apply. Once the cheap land is used up for these installations, what happens next?
TANSTAAFL.
You would need to build the solar collection portion of the plant over twice as large as the generator capacity dictates, because you only have 12 hours to collect the BTU's you need for all 24. That's also twice the land.
Maybe it's feasible, but the existing systems are mostly small - about 50MW. A baseload powerplant in the US is generally over 500MW - nukes go up to 1250. And like the nuclear industry found out, you can't just "scale up" a small design by an order of magnitude without problems.
Oh, yeah - then there's the 'West Coast to East Coast" thing - which our current grid can't do.
I have read of that model, although perhaps not that paper per se. Re-read my post - I didn't deny that wind was useful, only that it could not be dropped neatly into our existing grid and distribution models. This paper reiterates that - sure, wind can work - as long as you install an entirely new grid and control system to go with it!
For that matter, the OP took the position that wind and solar were peak load sources. That is patently incorrect - the model you cite shows wind as a replacement for baseload. The root of the distinction between peak and baseline generation is that you can turn peaking plants of and off when it is needed. Sure, you could handle that peak by increasing the base load capacity and then just under-loading it most of the time, but that's hugely inefficient. Wind and solar simply don't fit neatly into the curent power grid. That's not a condemnation, but a recognition that more has to change than "Just build windmills."
I understand that, but was drawing the parallel that Apple does have a history of entering other markets.
You may be correct that Garmin may be too big of a fish to swallow. Tomtom, however...
Sort of like their total lack of involvement with portable music devices and music distribution?
"In the same way that Walmart comes into a town and destroys local businesses, Google can enter into an industry/sector and destroy most of the competition overnight by giving an application away for free. Who is going to pay $100 for a Maps Application now (or more for a hardware device) when they can just download one for free.
Isn't this the same type of stuff we accused Microsoft of doing years ago? Yup, Walmart, I mean Google strikes again. Pray whatever industry you're in Google doesn't decide to suddenly release a free product."
Yeah, and then they jack up prices once the competition is gone!
Wait - they don't do that? They keep their prices low? Well, wtf?
There are plenty of reasons to dislike Walmart, but the "destroy competition" is the weakest one. The reason that is generally viewed as bad is that it has historically led to price increases, but that hasn't yet happened with Walmart. Same as Google.
The difference between them and MS is that, once MS had wiped out Netscape, it could divert resources away from browser development, and left us with IE6 for years. The consumer did not benefit. One might argue that the Wal-Mart/Google model is bad on a macroeconomic scale, but certainly not at the consumer level.
"Wind and solar are both geared to address peak. "
Bullshit - they aren't "geared" toward anything. Wind and solar don't work like that - the grid operators cannot simply turn on the wind or the sun. And that level of control is necessary for how we run our grid presently. Baseline is always on, and peak is on when dictated by demand, NOT availability. Solar is an especially good example of this - peak generating hours in many parts of the country occur in early evening in the summer, as people get home from work, turn on lights, cook, and the AC labors to take care of the load. But that's when your solar generation is going down. So you still need to fire up peaking plants to meet demand.
I'm not saying that wind and solar don't have their place, only that they don't drop as neatly into the electrical supply system as some would wish.
Way to miss the point - they ARE being run as a non-profit. They just happen to be very big and very rich.
I'm not denying that such things don't happen; I'm just saying that in this particular instance it works better as a cover story.
"So here is what I think Lee might ask today: why do people take pleasure in pretending (virtually) to kill innocent civilians? Or kill in general? Or eat people, as someone mentioned in Prototype (never played it)?"
I think he'd be struck by cognitive dissonance. The existence of our society where relatively few people have ACTUALLY been involved with violence is unprecedented. In earlier times, children knew exactly what death looked like - the boys hunted and the girls helped slaughter the chickens (note the same can be said of sex as well - no one needs to tell a farm kid about the birds and the bees when there's the pigs and sheep doin' it right there). So the idea that there are people who have made it to adulthood without seeing anything killed in real life (other than bugs) would be inconceivable. So I imagine the idea of those same people looking at *simulated* death would be just as foreign.
Whoops - I started thinking of the French retreating toward the west, then changed the wording to "looking" but forgot the change in direction. Just another dumb American who doesn't know his geography, I guess.
"This mode of looking at religion fails, because it assumes that religious people are mindless drones who will do whatever their priest tells them to do."
You've pegged the OP, but not the way you might think. The more I hear people being called "mindless drones" or other dismissive labels, the more I believe that the speaker is projecting his own fears and insecurities. Some people, afraid of being discovered to be unoriginal, or uninventive, or (God forbid) ordinary, react by shouting as loud as they can "Look at how THOSE people are!" and simultaneously whisper "and please don't look at how I am." I think it's the inverse of the body-modification crowd - people who feel ordinary, so they make changes to their outward appearance to make themselves "different".
I believe it is you who are being disingenuous. He wasn't implying that H1N1 will "pick up", i.e. increase in occurrence. He was simply pointing out that we are seeing deaths from H1N1 outside of the timeframe that is normally associated with seasonal flu. By inference then we can conclude that it is somehow different than regular seasonal flu. And it will likely kill more people, in total, than seasonal flu, since it has had a head start. H1N1
That being said, there is EVERY reason to believe that H1N1 will "pick up" throughout the normal flu season. That is because primary difference between this strain of H1N1 and the regular seasonal flu is that H1N1 has a substantially higher temperature tolerance than regular flu. Flu viruses are very sensitive to temperature in vitro - the difference of a few degrees means that the flu virus can survive for weeks on a surface vs. hours. So the reason why we are seeing H1N1 so early in the season is that it can survive the warmer environmental temperatures better. However, that does NOT mean that cooler temps are detrimental - it lasts just fine when it gets cooler. Now add to that the general decrease in health and immune system function during the cooler months, we certainly could expect more people to be infected than currently, and that they will have statistically worse outcomes.
This ties into your second point. You are confusing the "epidemic cycle" timeline with the flu season. Flu season is 5 months long solely due to environmental temperatures - they are the 5 coldest months, which makes the virus easier to transmit via environmental surfaces. That's it. Since we already know that H1N1 has a higher temperature tolerance, there is no reason whatsoever to assume that it will have a 5 month "duration". Given the way it's behaved so far, it's more like 10 months - September to June.
That being said, THIS DOES NOT MEAN IT'S 1918! But to ignore the fact that H1N1 is substantially different than regular seasonal flu is whistling in the wind. You yourself acknowledge that it has a different pattern of morbidity: "it will have killed about half again more kids than the normal seasonal flu. And probably far fewer people over 30." And the virus, on a statistical basis, is much more contagious than seasonal flu, simply by the fact that it stays in the environment longer. These facts are NOT controversial. So why does simply stating them get you in a tizzy?
There's another thing to consider. H1N1 appears to be a "mild" pandemic. Great. But the fact that it stays in the environment for so long, and so extends it's "season", there is a substantially higher risk that people will become infected with H1N1 and another strain simultaneously. This has the potential to be a Very Bad Thing. Different strains of virus can swap genetic material in that situation. Which brings us back to the previous flu scare, H5N1. Except that it isn't "previous" in an epidemiological sense - it's still chugging along. H5N1, which has a VERY high case fatality rate, hasn't gone pandemic because the virus hasn't evolved to allow easy human-human transmission. So we've dodged that bullet. But what happens if someone gets infected with H1N1 and H5N1 simultaneously? There is the potential for the viruses to swap genetic material. One result would be a virus with the CFR of Swine Flu and the transmissibility of Bird flu. Which may well have occurred already, because such a viral strain would immediately die o
"So there's a semiconductor executive that is talking about classified information in an interview? His/Her clearance should be revoked, at least temporarily, until an investigation can be performed to determine whether any laws were broken, and how long the executive should serve."
Unless he was asked to "confirm" it by US intelligence as part of a cover story for the REAL reason the Isrealis were able to take out the systems.
I think it's valuable to point out that, at least where small arms are concerned, the US military is quite aware of that. While many foreign designs have been adopted, the companies are required to establish production facilities in the US.
"Why? Is America planning to invade France?"
Of course not. There are no "plans" to invade France - we just show up with guns and the French Army surrenders. Although they we might have to tap them on the shoulder to get their attention - they've always previously surrendered while facing west.
And for those who would draw a negative example with Iraq, I'd point out that the likelihood of developing suicide bombers from the native French population is, well, nil.
Here's another explanation - it's a red herring. By floating this story, you kill 2 birds:
1) It "explains" the lack of Syrian response in a way that maintains security on the real capabilities of Israeli jamming, and
2) It sends foreign powers on a wild goose chase, spending resources trying to root out "kill switches" that aren't there. This takes away from resources that could be spent improving the system's ability to see through jamming.
The elegance is that it has JUST enough plausibility that it can't be ignored, due to the (now) well publicized Soviet gas pumping station sabotage.
"Consolidation" would have made sense - except nothing was consolidated. Consolidation implies an increase in efficiencies by removing duplicate functions. The creation of DHS did nothing of the sort - it simply re-drew the org chat and made a bunch of agencies report to a totally new layer of management. Basically, they added all of the administrative overhead of a new cabinet level department without a corresponding increase in actual tasks performed.
"If you are causing a domestic panic and threatening to not only revoke many of the liberties outlined in the Bill of Rights, but also threatening to shut down communication lines, funneling billions into lobbying interests, while using fear tactics surrounding an illness that I would best describe my first-hand experience as a "laughably mild cold, without the annoyance of a stuffy nose" you're not supporting terrorism, you are practicing the definition of it."
Let's see:
1) 9 year old son, tested positive for swine flu, puked all day, down with the squirts the next, right as rain the third. So I agree with you 100%
2) Former coworker, tested positive for swine flu 3 weeks ago, was out of work in bed for a week and still feels like crap. So I think you are 100% wrong.
Oh, wait - maybe I should make my opinions on DATA, and not anecdote.
Naaaaahhh.
"They operate like a business, owning land, stock, collecting money for services etc. They make a profit on a lot of these activities just like a business, why shouldn't they pay taxes like everyone else? "
If that is your criteria, then NOTHING would be tax exempt. If that's your point, ok, but don't kame out like the Catholic Church or other denominations are special in that regard.
"Sonny Bono, Scientologist and Senator, not only supported the Mickey Mouse Protection Act which extended copyright terms to 75 years plus the life of the creator, he got the damn bill named after itself. "
A quibble - Sonny Bono was dead (skiing accident) when the law was passed. They named it after him in memorial.
That doesn't make it a good law, or him a good legislator, but it is the truth.
"And have you tried those cookies that other fraud church gives out. Bland bland bland."
Yeah, but you get wine. True, it's basically a watered down Manischewitz, but it IS alcoholic, and they serve it to kids. In public. How cool is that!
"The Roman Catholic Church is one of the world's largest real estate companies and source of crazy statements by The Pope."
2 items:
1) your link points to a site regarding the LDS church, aka the Mormons which, last I checked, have nothing to do with the Roman Catholic Church
2) A lot of what churches do is legal under another part of the code cited.
"It is a government run agency. It will only become a problem when the senator who is chairman of some committee was told he couldn't bring his laptop as carry on, and it gets stolen as a checked item."
You have a fundamental misunderstanding of how it works. Said senator would not get the law changed; he would simply make sure that he got a special exception from complying with the law.
Example - when Ted Kennedy got held up at an airport for his name being on the no-fly list, the system didn't get changed. The list just had an asterisk added at the name "Kennedy" that said " *does not apply to the fat drunk claiming to be a Senator - he really is one."