A friend of mine called a Russian QA person that, and she was SORELY pissed. And this was only a few years ago, so that's why I believed the term was current.
There are a FEW hydro storage facilities in the US. The "extra energy" at night simply doesn't get produced - Gas turbines are throttled back, diesel engines are idled, for that matter even nukes can reduce power.
"When 70% of the coal plants are shut down because solar and wind have put them out of business, will we be looking for something even more expensive than coal?"
Of course not - by then our prime sources of baseload power will be unicorn farts and fairy sweat, and there's an inexhaustible supply of that.
"Assuming... a power grid capable of redistributing that power continent-wide"
Riiiight. That's like saying "Assuming a man can flap his arms and fly, how long would it take him to fly from NY to Chicago?"
That technology simply doesn't exist right now. Solar power advocates are betting on significant scientific breakthroughs for the system to work, yet they deride the coal and nuclear industries for making even less daring assumptions.
"In that case Russia should just join the EU like everyone else is doing. Then they can truly consider themselves "european" in not just name, but also fact. An EU extending from the Atlantic to the Pacific would make the U.S. shake in fear, and at last Europeans could restore their colonial-style hegemony over the entire world."
Ahh, but now you bring up the second Russian socio-political hangup from Tsarist times - fear of being invaded, of having their territory taken away, of being manipulated. they have good reason, as well - they HAVE been invaded a number of times, and it cost them dearly. But it's become a blockade to better relations - they see ALL interaction with the West as potential to lose something - territory, prestige, resources.
I saw a map by a Russian political thinker which shows the US split into 4 regions, with Canada taking the North Central states, Mexico taking South Central over to Florida, China taking the West Coast, and the EU taking the East Coast. The map was wholly preposterous (can you imagine SC and NY in a voluntary political union?), until you looked at the cultural background of the author. The Russian's greatest fear is being invaded by outsiders and parceled up. So they projected that onto the US, looking at the States as territory and not individual political entities.
Besides which, I already know how it will go after the USA falls apart: the New England states will form the nation of...New England; NY will go their own way, California will split into 3, and the Confederacy will rise again.
"So it would take a couple days of planes dropping bombs to flatten Dresden. Even without nukes there is something appalling about our capacity to destroy one another."
And how many Tutsis were were killed by Hutus using machete's?
Not going back far enough. The Russian fear of being perceived as backass country folk goes all the way back to the Tsars. Russia really wanted to be counted among European nobility, but could never really cut it, so they are hyper-sensitive to anything indicating that they are not up-to-date/cutting edge. AFAIK, "nekulturny" (literally, uncultured) is still the highest insult you can throw at a Russian.
There are more than 100 fission reactors, called "light water reactors" (LWRs), producing power in the United States. The nuclear waste from these reactors is stored and not reprocessed. (Some other countries, such as France and Japan, do reprocess the waste.)
The scientists' waste destruction system would work in two major steps.
First, 75 percent of the original reactor waste is destroyed in standard, relatively inexpensive LWRs. This step produces energy, but it does not destroy highly radiotoxic, transuranic, long-lived waste, what the scientists call "sludge."
In the second step, the sludge would be destroyed in a CFNS-based fusion-fission hybrid. The hybrid's potential lies in its ability to burn this hazardous sludge, which cannot be stably burnt in conventional systems.
So, the first step is to reprocess the fuel, which: a) isn't allowed by an Executive Order b) would alleviate the need for massive storage areas for spent fuel - the transuranic waste is smaller in volume to spent fuel by an order of magnitude. At that size, there are potentially more disposal options.
Nuclear waste is a political issue, not an engineering issue.
The scripts for the follow ups could be based on the Ringworld sequels - they may be a lower grade of SF, but they are a damned sight better than what gets accepted for scripts these days.
I'd like to see Niven's short stories done up Twilight Zone style, but that kind of anthology TV hasn't worked in many years.
I played youth soccer in the late 70's/early 80's. I was a goalkeeper mostly and got a rep for bravery/idiocy due to the fact that, if someone broke away and was going to take a shot, I'd run out and jump on the ball. This inevitably led to being kicked in the head - hard - about 3x. At the time, I was viewed as having great big balls and just sat out until the throbbing stopped, then got right back in there. I wasn't seriously concussed - not dizzy, etc. - but I'd definitely had my bell rung.
Fast forward, and after decades of trouble in school and at work with focus and motivation, I was diagnosed with dysthymia, a form of chronic depression. I don't know that I can pin it on soccer - I seem to remember having depressive episodes before I started playing - but it is intriguing nonetheless. And I'm going to keep a closer eye on the wrestlers I coach, including my son.
Since Scott has a track record of putting out decent science fiction cinema, could we PLEASE get him to do some Heinlein? Or, if that's not "percussive" enough, some Niven-Pournelle? A shortened version of A Mote in God's Eye should have enough bang-bang to keep the kiddies happy, and cool aliens that turn from "advanced peaceful society" to "Freakish monster hoards" by the end.
Ahhh - That's what they tried to do with handguns, and actually did in Massachusetts. They couldn't get gun control laws passed, so the AG declared guns to be under the jurisdiction of the Mass CPC. The stuff that required was "interesting" from a safety standpoint - hidden serial numbers, requiring that all handguns pass a "temperature" test (800F, so no Glocks, et al.)
So now the federal CPSC is going to regulate how cell phone cameras work, NOT to protect the user, but to protect everyone else FROM the user.
It's NOT a refrigerator. Refrigerators use the refrigeration cycle to move hat from one place to another. This is basically a Peltier. That doesn't make it any less valuable for it's purpose, but why didn't they just call it a "cooler"? I mean, it's not like the audience for these types of announcements is tech-illiterate.
So he's a libertarian. BFD. I've worked for years with a pretty hardcore libertarian myself, and I agree with some of his views. We have had quite spirited debates on various libertarian theories, and he's a quite accomplished debater. But it wasn't the libertarianism that turns me off. My point was that the author of this book seemed to be drawing together 3 wildly differing philosophies - that's if you can call "Aquarian Age" a coherent philosophy.
Don't pretend that all I need to do is "open my mind". I believe it is you who needs to open his eyes - the populace doesn't WANT the responsibility that libertarianism offers. It's not a matter of philosophy, but psychology - people want a minimum of constraints AND a minimum of risk. they believe that laws and government will give them that. Whether it actually accomplishes that is irrelevant.
Slashdot Mirror
"Except for the colonel of course, he always seems to get more than the normal process."
That's because some processes are more equal than others.
A friend of mine called a Russian QA person that, and she was SORELY pissed. And this was only a few years ago, so that's why I believed the term was current.
There are a FEW hydro storage facilities in the US. The "extra energy" at night simply doesn't get produced - Gas turbines are throttled back, diesel engines are idled, for that matter even nukes can reduce power.
"When 70% of the coal plants are shut down because solar and wind have put them out of business, will we be looking for something even more expensive than coal?"
Of course not - by then our prime sources of baseload power will be unicorn farts and fairy sweat, and there's an inexhaustible supply of that.
"Assuming ... a power grid capable of redistributing that power continent-wide"
Riiiight. That's like saying "Assuming a man can flap his arms and fly, how long would it take him to fly from NY to Chicago?"
That technology simply doesn't exist right now. Solar power advocates are betting on significant scientific breakthroughs for the system to work, yet they deride the coal and nuclear industries for making even less daring assumptions.
Ahh, but now you bring up the second Russian socio-political hangup from Tsarist times - fear of being invaded, of having their territory taken away, of being manipulated. they have good reason, as well - they HAVE been invaded a number of times, and it cost them dearly. But it's become a blockade to better relations - they see ALL interaction with the West as potential to lose something - territory, prestige, resources.
I saw a map by a Russian political thinker which shows the US split into 4 regions, with Canada taking the North Central states, Mexico taking South Central over to Florida, China taking the West Coast, and the EU taking the East Coast. The map was wholly preposterous (can you imagine SC and NY in a voluntary political union?), until you looked at the cultural background of the author. The Russian's greatest fear is being invaded by outsiders and parceled up. So they projected that onto the US, looking at the States as territory and not individual political entities.
Besides which, I already know how it will go after the USA falls apart: the New England states will form the nation of...New England; NY will go their own way, California will split into 3, and the Confederacy will rise again.
"So it would take a couple days of planes dropping bombs to flatten Dresden. Even without nukes there is something appalling about our capacity to destroy one another."
And how many Tutsis were were killed by Hutus using machete's?
Technology is not the problem.
Not going back far enough. The Russian fear of being perceived as backass country folk goes all the way back to the Tsars. Russia really wanted to be counted among European nobility, but could never really cut it, so they are hyper-sensitive to anything indicating that they are not up-to-date/cutting edge. AFAIK, "nekulturny" (literally, uncultured) is still the highest insult you can throw at a Russian.
"Our programmers are some of the best in the world,"
Of course - after all, those viruses don't program themselves, now do they?
Except for one thing - the sun DOESN'T SHINE for an average of 12 hrs/day.
You need to find a replacement for baseload power.
"There are safer alternatives"
Name one.
"Generations ago a single bomb couldn't incinerate millions of people."
To eviscerate means, literally, to remove the viscera. That's innards in the colloqial.
FTA:
So, the first step is to reprocess the fuel, which:
a) isn't allowed by an Executive Order
b) would alleviate the need for massive storage areas for spent fuel - the transuranic waste is smaller in volume to spent fuel by an order of magnitude. At that size, there are potentially more disposal options.
Nuclear waste is a political issue, not an engineering issue.
I believe you mean "with Donald Sutherland".http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0111003/
The scripts for the follow ups could be based on the Ringworld sequels - they may be a lower grade of SF, but they are a damned sight better than what gets accepted for scripts these days.
I'd like to see Niven's short stories done up Twilight Zone style, but that kind of anthology TV hasn't worked in many years.
I played youth soccer in the late 70's/early 80's. I was a goalkeeper mostly and got a rep for bravery/idiocy due to the fact that, if someone broke away and was going to take a shot, I'd run out and jump on the ball. This inevitably led to being kicked in the head - hard - about 3x. At the time, I was viewed as having great big balls and just sat out until the throbbing stopped, then got right back in there. I wasn't seriously concussed - not dizzy, etc. - but I'd definitely had my bell rung.
Fast forward, and after decades of trouble in school and at work with focus and motivation, I was diagnosed with dysthymia, a form of chronic depression. I don't know that I can pin it on soccer - I seem to remember having depressive episodes before I started playing - but it is intriguing nonetheless. And I'm going to keep a closer eye on the wrestlers I coach, including my son.
Since Scott has a track record of putting out decent science fiction cinema, could we PLEASE get him to do some Heinlein? Or, if that's not "percussive" enough, some Niven-Pournelle? A shortened version of A Mote in God's Eye should have enough bang-bang to keep the kiddies happy, and cool aliens that turn from "advanced peaceful society" to "Freakish monster hoards" by the end.
"I see your personal anecdote and raise you several second hand antidotes!"
Really not that compelling.
Ahhh - That's what they tried to do with handguns, and actually did in Massachusetts. They couldn't get gun control laws passed, so the AG declared guns to be under the jurisdiction of the Mass CPC. The stuff that required was "interesting" from a safety standpoint - hidden serial numbers, requiring that all handguns pass a "temperature" test (800F, so no Glocks, et al.)
So now the federal CPSC is going to regulate how cell phone cameras work, NOT to protect the user, but to protect everyone else FROM the user.
"Probably a rare occurrence, but this means bystanders won't be able to photograph arrests in progress without alerting the police."
Fixed that for ya'
It's NOT a refrigerator. Refrigerators use the refrigeration cycle to move hat from one place to another. This is basically a Peltier. That doesn't make it any less valuable for it's purpose, but why didn't they just call it a "cooler"? I mean, it's not like the audience for these types of announcements is tech-illiterate.
Yes, I remember reading that plan here on Slashdot - it was remarkable in that it seemed to wholly ignore the law of gravity.
Besides, if we really can direct the trajectory of space objects, I'd suggest dropping them on Congress.
So he's a libertarian. BFD. I've worked for years with a pretty hardcore libertarian myself, and I agree with some of his views. We have had quite spirited debates on various libertarian theories, and he's a quite accomplished debater. But it wasn't the libertarianism that turns me off. My point was that the author of this book seemed to be drawing together 3 wildly differing philosophies - that's if you can call "Aquarian Age" a coherent philosophy.
Don't pretend that all I need to do is "open my mind". I believe it is you who needs to open his eyes - the populace doesn't WANT the responsibility that libertarianism offers. It's not a matter of philosophy, but psychology - people want a minimum of constraints AND a minimum of risk. they believe that laws and government will give them that. Whether it actually accomplishes that is irrelevant.
Actually, I should apologize - I read your comment too hastily and misinterpreted it. God knows there are other posting that deserve it.
Sorry.
"Pelosi must be having a fit...LOL"
After today's NY Senatorial pick, she'll have an aneurysm - the lady has an "A" rating from the NRA.