If you're looking at yearly average precipitation, you won't get the real picture. Most of California's precipitation falls during the winter in the mountains as snow. It doesn't rain during the summer rice growing season (hence my calling it a desert... at least in the summer). Most years, the rice is irrigated by melting snow. Sacramento Valley gets about 3 inches a rain a month from November through March and that drops to near zero through the Summer months. The Sacramento Valley is the primary rice growing area.
Growing rice is "perfectly sound" only if you ignore the downstream effects which even with "normal" water years have brought the Delta to the brink of ecologic collapse. "The Delta is an ecosystem on the verge of collapse due to invasive species, pollution and the destruction of most of the area’s wetland and river habitat. Existing water-supply operations have also had profound impacts on the Delta. They have transformed the estuary into what is now essentially a freshwater lake and have reversed the natural direction of the rivers flowing out of the Delta. As a result of these and other issues, several native species are on the brink of extinction. Unless there is a sustainable path forward in the Delta, we will continue to see ecological collapse of the estuary with further reductions in water supply for cities and agriculture." - See more at: http://www.nature.org/ouriniti...
Farmers in California grow a lot of rice which requires a lot of water. Most places that grow rice have lots of water. In California, even in "normal" years, there is no rain in the summer (dry season) so they have extensive dams and canals paid for by state and federal taxpayers which provide them lots of cheap water. This year, there is a drought so the reservoirs are dry and the farmers are whinging seriously about "their" water. California has lots of water for people... not so much to grow rice in the desert. (Same argument applies to most California farming which uses an unsustainable amount of water to grow food in a desert.)
I believe that they define "average use" as the average of all of their residential users... duh. As their users decrease their usage, the average should go down... duh. What you seem to be proposing is for them to arbitrarily define "average use" to some hypothetical number so that everyone would be "above average"... I don't think that's the way it works or that is should be necessary to lie to their customers. It should be sufficient to just keep the "average use" number current with the actual average use and that way, hopefully, average use will decrease (which is the point of the whole exercise).
I believe that he only has temporary asylum in Russia now so he needs lawyers to try to arrange something more permanent somewhere. (Preferably not a permanent cell at Gitmo.)
This is the problem. You state that there is "zero evidence" that TDCPP leads to cancer in humans. The NIH, OTOH, says this: "In recent years, animal studies have suggested that TDCPP is neurotoxic, an endocrine disruptor, and a reproductive toxicant.4,5,6 The National Research Council has reported TDCPP to be linked to cancer in rats,7 and the chemical is on California’s Proposition 65 list of substances known to cause cancer.8 However, its potential carcinogencity has not been classified by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the International Agency for Research on Cancer, or the National Toxicology Program." The problem is that you may say that this NIH statement is not based on evidence or that the evidence is equivocal. Most people would think otherwise. Since chemical manufacturers are allowed to make and sell anything without proving that it is safe, they can continue to promote TDCPP until somebody (funded by ?) proves it is dangerous. Since chemicals can be produced and used without proof of their safety, we are all part of a large uncontrolled experiment. Some of us will get sick and die. Chemical companies get rich.
The basic problem is that industry gets to invent new chemicals and to use them with very little testing. Since it can easily take 10 or 20 years to discover toxicities, this means that we are all participating in a giant uncontrolled experiment to discover which chemicals are bad for us. There are about 100,000 industrial chemicals in use today and very few of these have been rigorously tested. The rest are being tested on us. Of course, it is very difficult to sort out which of the thousands of chemicals we are exposed to are causing which of our many toxic effects so lots of opportunity for psychopathic corporations to perseverate and keep their profits flowing. A good case in point is California TB117 which required flame retardants in furniture starting in 1975. Over the years TDCPP (chlorinated Tris... listed as a carcinogen by California in 2011), PentaBDE, (pentabrominated diphenyl ether, globally banned due to toxicity and environmental persistence) and Firemaster 550, (associated with obesity and anxiety in one animal study) were used in massive quantities causing untold damage (and no real improvement in flame resistance). After years of studies and lots of resistance from chemical companies (fake studies, astroturf groups, etc.) California finally allowed furniture to be made without fire retardants (although they were not banned). BTW, since it is inconvenient for manufacturers to make California specific furniture, everyone in the country was exposed to these chemicals. There have been federal and state attempts to pass legislation requiring more testing of chemicals but, of course, these are going nowhere since it would interfere with chemical industry profits and they can bribe legislators to get their way.
This is an impressive rant but it you spent as much time researching the problem as you took to write the rant, you could solve your problems. On the cloud: Dropbox, etc. have clients for all OSs. You can even use Owncloud to have complete control. Updating: You could spend a few minutes to set up your options to update when and where you want (Google it... all of the OSs have these options). PDFs: Again, spend a few minutes to find a PDF reader that has the options you want.
(I did enjoy your rant, though. Good to see someone get this worked up on a Saturday morning. Maybe you should try getting outside more.)
There is plenty of food, energy, materials for everyone in the world. The problem is because of the greed of the 1%, there is a severe worldwide mal-distribution of those resources.
I agree. Greed is the problem. There is enough food and wealth in the world to provide everyone with a good life. The problem is that the greed of the rich who control the political systems allows them to accumulate wealth far beyond their needs and keep the rest of the world (the 99%, if you will) in poverty. Case is point: Walmart has $28 billion in profit and 2 million employees (including part timers). They could give every one of their employees an extra $14,000 a year and still not have to raise prices. Why don't they?... because of the entitled greed of the owners. If you look across the entire US economy, you find a similar situation. Total corporate profits are about 2,000 billion dollars. Divide this by total employment (145 million) and you get about the same number. Corporations could give every employee a $14,000 raise. The problem is not lack of resources, it is greed leading to mal-distribution of resources.
One fact that has been observed is that as societies get richer, the birth rate plummets. This extends to the point where some countries such as Japan have a decreasing population. The best way to reduce the birth rate is to have well educated, prosperous society. The problem of "overpopulation" will take care of itself if we improve income (and spread out the distribution of wealth).
Re:What do we do with all the people though?
on
Star Trek Economics
·
· Score: 2
You need to understand that there is more to life than work. Think families, friends, recreation, socialization, art... As for the people who "need" to have somebody waiting on them hand and foot... I say we don't need those greedy bastards.
The problem is that it is very difficult for the average consumer (or even techie) to tell when something is high quality and hence worth more. I have found that most of the time, the cheap stuff is adequate. If I want quality, I have to spend a lot of time researching. Sometimes you can trust brands to produce quality stuff and to stand behind it if it breaks. Other times, not so much, and the task is complicated by counterfeits. A recent example... I wanted to buy a few standard 18650 lithium rechargeable batteries for a project. Going through Amazon, the prices ranged from $3 to $10 each. There were various brands Sony, Panasonic, Samsung which I know and trust and I also came across a brand called UltraFire which may be good but seems to suffer from a lot of counterfeiting. I ended up buying the most expensive Sony for $10 since they were the only brand with uniformly good reviews. All of the others seemed to have a number of duds and I didn't want to hassle with failures and returns.
I think they are using this technology: http://www.apartmenttherapy.co... 10 Ways to Use Mirrors to Make Your Space Look Larger See, it's space and magnification... Here are a few hot tips from the article... 1. Group Them Together: 2. Behind The Stove: 3. Turn Them On Their Side: 4. Cabinet Fronts: 5. Next To Your Dining Room Table: 6. Floor Length: 7. Layer Them Up: 8. Fake A Window: 9. Beautiful Backsplashes: 10. Fake Mirrored Furniture:
From the looks of it, they are using all of these tricks in this new satellite.
My favorite from TFA: "There are two amazing things I need to point out here. First: the International Space Station runs Linux. Second: the ISS used to run Windows. And, when it did, they managed to end up with a virus and malware epidemic caused by infected USB thumb drives. From Russia. That is not a joke, nor is it the plot of a James Bond movie. That actually happened. In space."
"A lot of the Republicans Cluelessness is based on bad data. The main issue is that the Republicans are supporting the base of the groups that yell the loudest, and think they are supporting a majority."
"Yell the loudest" is best translated as "give the most money". They have very good data on their donors and they follow this data. Their rich donors want less government regulation and lower taxes so they can make more money. They also have a few fringe wacko social issues (abortion, racists, misogynists, etc.) who help rally "the little people".
TFA stated that the light ballasts were made by GE and that they were aware of the problem and had a procedure to replace them. Probably this is an issue of who is going to pay to replace all of the ballasts... this won't be cheap.
This is not about defense or missiles. This is about keeping our defense contractors fat and happy. Missile defenses have never worked very well... mostly failures... but that doesn't stop our government from throwing billions at the "problem" when the money could be of some actual use building bridges and roads or trains. It's just like the war on terror. Lots of fear generated leading to lots of wasted spending which is mostly ineffective. It does keep the contractors happy and profitable and that it the primary purpose. Your job as a taxpayer is to: 1. Be afraid... very afraid 2. Work hard at your crappy job and pay lots of taxes 3. Don't complain because then you are a communist, socialist, liberal crybaby who only wants to destroy Amerika.
I would if I could (see second point in my post). Even when I type slashdot.org I end up with m.slashdot.org If I set Chrome to "Request desktop site" it "forgets" this setting so I have to do it each time.
Sorry for posting this off-topic but there is no other place to post this, so... The mobile site: - lousy view and navigation - confusing display of mod points - no way to view normal site... mobile site is mandatory - doesn't remember my login - moderation doesn't work - can't change view by mod points (outstanding, etc. categories are broken) Breaking news! Now, just added!!! "popover" ads that won't go away!!! I had an obnoxious ad for a survey overlay the site. Won't close. In desperation, I even clicked on it to take the survey (and entered bogus information to screw up their responses) but still the ad won't go away! (I'm using Chrome browser on Nexus7... if that makes any difference).
Slashdot Mirror
I was about to point out that many vegetables do cast a shadow until I looked up "level 5 vegan".
Good show.
If you're looking at yearly average precipitation, you won't get the real picture. Most of California's precipitation falls during the winter in the mountains as snow. It doesn't rain during the summer rice growing season (hence my calling it a desert... at least in the summer). Most years, the rice is irrigated by melting snow.
Sacramento Valley gets about 3 inches a rain a month from November through March and that drops to near zero through the Summer months.
The Sacramento Valley is the primary rice growing area.
Growing rice is "perfectly sound" only if you ignore the downstream effects which even with "normal" water years have brought the Delta to the brink of ecologic collapse.
"The Delta is an ecosystem on the verge of collapse due to invasive species, pollution and the destruction of most of the area’s wetland and river habitat. Existing water-supply operations have also had profound impacts on the Delta. They have transformed the estuary into what is now essentially a freshwater lake and have reversed the natural direction of the rivers flowing out of the Delta. As a result of these and other issues, several native species are on the brink of extinction. Unless there is a sustainable path forward in the Delta, we will continue to see ecological collapse of the estuary with further reductions in water supply for cities and agriculture." - See more at: http://www.nature.org/ouriniti...
Farmers in California grow a lot of rice which requires a lot of water. Most places that grow rice have lots of water. In California, even in "normal" years, there is no rain in the summer (dry season) so they have extensive dams and canals paid for by state and federal taxpayers which provide them lots of cheap water.
This year, there is a drought so the reservoirs are dry and the farmers are whinging seriously about "their" water.
California has lots of water for people... not so much to grow rice in the desert.
(Same argument applies to most California farming which uses an unsustainable amount of water to grow food in a desert.)
I believe that they define "average use" as the average of all of their residential users... duh.
As their users decrease their usage, the average should go down... duh.
What you seem to be proposing is for them to arbitrarily define "average use" to some hypothetical number so that everyone would be "above average"... I don't think that's the way it works or that is should be necessary to lie to their customers. It should be sufficient to just keep the "average use" number current with the actual average use and that way, hopefully, average use will decrease (which is the point of the whole exercise).
I believe that he only has temporary asylum in Russia now so he needs lawyers to try to arrange something more permanent somewhere. (Preferably not a permanent cell at Gitmo.)
Vitamins?? In pizza??
This is the problem.
You state that there is "zero evidence" that TDCPP leads to cancer in humans.
The NIH, OTOH, says this: "In recent years, animal studies have suggested that TDCPP is neurotoxic, an endocrine disruptor, and a reproductive toxicant.4,5,6 The National Research Council has reported TDCPP to be linked to cancer in rats,7 and the chemical is on California’s Proposition 65 list of substances known to cause cancer.8 However, its potential carcinogencity has not been classified by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the International Agency for Research on Cancer, or the National Toxicology Program."
The problem is that you may say that this NIH statement is not based on evidence or that the evidence is equivocal. Most people would think otherwise. Since chemical manufacturers are allowed to make and sell anything without proving that it is safe, they can continue to promote TDCPP until somebody (funded by ?) proves it is dangerous.
Since chemicals can be produced and used without proof of their safety, we are all part of a large uncontrolled experiment. Some of us will get sick and die. Chemical companies get rich.
The basic problem is that industry gets to invent new chemicals and to use them with very little testing. Since it can easily take 10 or 20 years to discover toxicities, this means that we are all participating in a giant uncontrolled experiment to discover which chemicals are bad for us. There are about 100,000 industrial chemicals in use today and very few of these have been rigorously tested. The rest are being tested on us. Of course, it is very difficult to sort out which of the thousands of chemicals we are exposed to are causing which of our many toxic effects so lots of opportunity for psychopathic corporations to perseverate and keep their profits flowing.
A good case in point is California TB117 which required flame retardants in furniture starting in 1975. Over the years TDCPP (chlorinated Tris... listed as a carcinogen by California in 2011), PentaBDE, (pentabrominated diphenyl ether, globally banned due to toxicity and environmental persistence) and Firemaster 550, (associated with obesity and anxiety in one animal study) were used in massive quantities causing untold damage (and no real improvement in flame resistance). After years of studies and lots of resistance from chemical companies (fake studies, astroturf groups, etc.) California finally allowed furniture to be made without fire retardants (although they were not banned). BTW, since it is inconvenient for manufacturers to make California specific furniture, everyone in the country was exposed to these chemicals.
There have been federal and state attempts to pass legislation requiring more testing of chemicals but, of course, these are going nowhere since it would interfere with chemical industry profits and they can bribe legislators to get their way.
This is an impressive rant but it you spent as much time researching the problem as you took to write the rant, you could solve your problems.
On the cloud: Dropbox, etc. have clients for all OSs. You can even use Owncloud to have complete control.
Updating: You could spend a few minutes to set up your options to update when and where you want (Google it... all of the OSs have these options).
PDFs: Again, spend a few minutes to find a PDF reader that has the options you want.
(I did enjoy your rant, though. Good to see someone get this worked up on a Saturday morning. Maybe you should try getting outside more.)
There is plenty of food, energy, materials for everyone in the world.
The problem is because of the greed of the 1%, there is a severe worldwide mal-distribution of those resources.
Discuss...
I agree. Greed is the problem.
There is enough food and wealth in the world to provide everyone with a good life.
The problem is that the greed of the rich who control the political systems allows them to accumulate wealth far beyond their needs and keep the rest of the world (the 99%, if you will) in poverty.
Case is point: Walmart has $28 billion in profit and 2 million employees (including part timers). They could give every one of their employees an extra $14,000 a year and still not have to raise prices. Why don't they?... because of the entitled greed of the owners.
If you look across the entire US economy, you find a similar situation. Total corporate profits are about 2,000 billion dollars. Divide this by total employment (145 million) and you get about the same number. Corporations could give every employee a $14,000 raise.
The problem is not lack of resources, it is greed leading to mal-distribution of resources.
One fact that has been observed is that as societies get richer, the birth rate plummets. This extends to the point where some countries such as Japan have a decreasing population.
The best way to reduce the birth rate is to have well educated, prosperous society.
The problem of "overpopulation" will take care of itself if we improve income (and spread out the distribution of wealth).
You need to understand that there is more to life than work.
Think families, friends, recreation, socialization, art...
As for the people who "need" to have somebody waiting on them hand and foot... I say we don't need those greedy bastards.
You may find artists annoying but I'd be happy seeing more art and more artists.
If people had a guaranteed income, more would be free to be artists.
Here's a list of about 100 Android apps which use Open Street Map...
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/...
And, of course, navigation:
https://play.google.com/store/...
The problem is that it is very difficult for the average consumer (or even techie) to tell when something is high quality and hence worth more. I have found that most of the time, the cheap stuff is adequate. If I want quality, I have to spend a lot of time researching. Sometimes you can trust brands to produce quality stuff and to stand behind it if it breaks. Other times, not so much, and the task is complicated by counterfeits.
A recent example... I wanted to buy a few standard 18650 lithium rechargeable batteries for a project. Going through Amazon, the prices ranged from $3 to $10 each. There were various brands Sony, Panasonic, Samsung which I know and trust and I also came across a brand called UltraFire which may be good but seems to suffer from a lot of counterfeiting. I ended up buying the most expensive Sony for $10 since they were the only brand with uniformly good reviews. All of the others seemed to have a number of duds and I didn't want to hassle with failures and returns.
I think they are using this technology:
http://www.apartmenttherapy.co...
10 Ways to Use Mirrors to Make Your Space Look Larger
See, it's space and magnification...
Here are a few hot tips from the article...
1. Group Them Together:
2. Behind The Stove:
3. Turn Them On Their Side:
4. Cabinet Fronts:
5. Next To Your Dining Room Table:
6. Floor Length:
7. Layer Them Up:
8. Fake A Window:
9. Beautiful Backsplashes:
10. Fake Mirrored Furniture:
From the looks of it, they are using all of these tricks in this new satellite.
My favorite from TFA:
"There are two amazing things I need to point out here. First: the International Space Station runs Linux. Second: the ISS used to run Windows. And, when it did, they managed to end up with a virus and malware epidemic caused by infected USB thumb drives. From Russia. That is not a joke, nor is it the plot of a James Bond movie. That actually happened. In space."
"A lot of the Republicans Cluelessness is based on bad data. The main issue is that the Republicans are supporting the base of the groups that yell the loudest, and think they are supporting a majority."
"Yell the loudest" is best translated as "give the most money".
They have very good data on their donors and they follow this data. Their rich donors want less government regulation and lower taxes so they can make more money. They also have a few fringe wacko social issues (abortion, racists, misogynists, etc.) who help rally "the little people".
TFA stated that the light ballasts were made by GE and that they were aware of the problem and had a procedure to replace them.
Probably this is an issue of who is going to pay to replace all of the ballasts... this won't be cheap.
This is not about defense or missiles. This is about keeping our defense contractors fat and happy. Missile defenses have never worked very well... mostly failures... but that doesn't stop our government from throwing billions at the "problem" when the money could be of some actual use building bridges and roads or trains.
It's just like the war on terror. Lots of fear generated leading to lots of wasted spending which is mostly ineffective.
It does keep the contractors happy and profitable and that it the primary purpose.
Your job as a taxpayer is to:
1. Be afraid... very afraid
2. Work hard at your crappy job and pay lots of taxes
3. Don't complain because then you are a communist, socialist, liberal crybaby who only wants to destroy Amerika.
Also, the Beta site sucks.
Perhaps you were thinking of Fiat:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...
I would if I could (see second point in my post).
Even when I type slashdot.org I end up with m.slashdot.org
If I set Chrome to "Request desktop site" it "forgets" this setting so I have to do it each time.
Sorry for posting this off-topic but there is no other place to post this, so...
The mobile site:
- lousy view and navigation - confusing display of mod points
- no way to view normal site... mobile site is mandatory
- doesn't remember my login
- moderation doesn't work
- can't change view by mod points (outstanding, etc. categories are broken)
Breaking news! Now, just added!!! "popover" ads that won't go away!!!
I had an obnoxious ad for a survey overlay the site. Won't close.
In desperation, I even clicked on it to take the survey (and entered bogus information to screw up their responses) but still the ad won't go away!
(I'm using Chrome browser on Nexus7... if that makes any difference).