I would like to take this moment to recommend Francis Crick's The Astonishing Hypothesis to anyone interested in cognitive science. Although the theory of consciousness he espouses is somewhat uninteresting, the book does provide a good overview of the mechanisms by which the human brain functions, and it also describes the field of Cog Sci to some depth.
I would be alarmed by that article if most of it were even misleading instead of simply false.
The Price-Andersen Act simply allows the government to act as an insurance broker for nuclear power plants. The plants PAY for the insurance, and it only covers small accidents-- maximum liability for the government is something like $10 million. Furthermore, the act allows for priave companies to step in to take over the insurace after a period of some years-- something that private companies have indeed done. (The PA Act has actually made taxpayers money, as plants have paid out more than they have received, just like any successful insurance company. So it doesn't count as subsidy at all.)
As for the "$66 billion" figure, that's even worse. They mean, "The military has spent $66 billion researching nuclear reactors for their own use between 1948 and 1998."
Nuclear power does receive some subsidies, but not many-- especially compared to wind and solar, which are absolutely not cost effective. Coal, the second cheapest method of generating electricity (next to nuclear, unremarkably), receives over a billion dollars a year from the federal government just to support miners who have developed black lung disease. Oil receives billions as well. In fact, anything you can name receives more money than nuclear.
Nuclear power is not popular, and politicians know it. If nuclear power really received these nefarious subsidies, every senator in Congress would be biting at it so s/he could claim to be "fighting for safer power." Do you really think any member of Congress could pass up the chance to guarantee re-election?
(PS-- solar has some nasty hazardous waste products. The panels themselves are about as toxic as cyanide, as measured by LD50, and generous amounts of arsenic are produced as a result of the doping process of the silicon panels. Furthermore, when solar panels electromigrate, that's it-- if you try to recycle them, you end up using more energy than you got out of the panel in the first place. Those shiny toxic squares have to be thrown away.)
IANANT,BIASTGMOLAARR (Not a nuclear technician, but I am studying to get my operator's license at a research reactor.)
"...and will support e-government initiatives and a more productive mobile workforce."
Let's see how many buzzwords we can pack into that last dependent clause:
"...and will grow e-civil management initiatives and will improve the morale of the mindshare in a more immersive global knowledge worker production environment."
Want to know what the cost of food is? It's the cost of manufacturing fertilizer (energy); tilling land and fueling tractors (energy); planting seeds with big machines (energy); harvesting, processing and shipping food (energy); refrigerating it (energy); and paying people to do all those things (most of whose incomes exist so that they have money to pay for the energy to buy their own food).
Your $1400/month salary would suddenly feel like $800/month at best.
Oh, and wind and solar cost more than twice nuclear. (Remember that wind and solar work best in certain choice locations; if we switched over to all solar or wind, we'd run out of locations in a hurry.)
I ordered cable Internet from Charter a few years ago. The good thing was that they had someone out there in less than a week. The bad thing was everything else.
At the same time, we switched from satellite to cable TV. Just in case Charter had problems, I told them NOT to remove the satellite dish. At some point during the install, he decided to use the coax coming off the dish-- which he pulled out of the wall, leaving a hole in my garage's wall. Furthermore, he hit the dish-- hard-- and dented it, rendering it worthless.
I wasn't home at the time, and I knew he'd need to access my computer, so I set up an administrator account on Windows for him. (Hey, It was 2001, I hadn't switched to Linux yet.) I left this note for him, exactly these words: "username: Charterguy; no password." It's probably a good thing that he couldn't figure out what "no password" meant, seeing as he would have ruined my computer if he got onto it. (Of course, he left without running any cables or installing the modem, because he couldn't log on to my computer.)
And, just to add insult to injury, that night, when I went to sleep, I could swear that I was hearing voices! Turns out, he left his radio in my attic. (And those radios last for days on a charge if you only listen on them without transmitting.) I never did find it, so for the next three days, I slept to the sound of field calls.
From a MS ad embeeded in the article: "Windows Server 2003 offers a savings of 11-22% over Linux in 4 out of 5 workplace scenarios."
From the text of the article: "The company said in a 2001 Securities and Exchange Commission filing that Linux cut its technology expenses by $16 million, or 25 percent."
The US relies heavily (entirely?) on "terminator" mines that deactivate themselves after a certain period of time, say a few days or months. They started this in Vietnam so that they wouldn't have to worry about clearing their own minefields.
It doesn't make them totally safe, but it still eliminates 90% of the danger associated with landmines.
This is wrong, not insightful. We already have naval fuel tankers, and we already have nuclear reactors on EVERY DAMN SHIP THAT'S BIG ENOUGH TO HOLD ONE. The only difference between hydrogen and the hydrocarbon fuels we already lug around is that hydrogen causes less damage when it burns. (And it burns, not explodes.)
We haven't had any of the trouble he's forecasting.
1) Make sure you're running Linux or another POSIX. 2) Install XMMS. 3) Right-click your playlist, select "Add>URL." 4) Type "tone://18000" 5) Play the tone.
That's 18 kHz. At this response rate, you can hear a clear beat frequency (meaning that it sounds like the volume is rising and falling rhythmically).
The iPod recognizes two different kinds of files: data, which are files stored using the iPod as a removable drive and that can be transferred to any computer of your choice; and music, which are loaded onto the iPod through iTunes/Musicmatch/whatever and that cannot be transferred to a different computer.
You can load anything as data (including MP3s and AACs), but the iPod will only play files loaded as music.
eMusic == indy labels and deals made with artists directly
I picked a stance, and I'm sticking with it.
Re:tomorrows weather, 20 and sunny.
on
Global Dimming
·
· Score: 1
WEATHER != CLIMATE
The difference between predicting the climate and predicting the weather is the same as the difference between predicting if anyone will win the lottery and predicting the winning numbers.
Slashdot Mirror
Wait... so is someone other than Microsoft getting credit for Clippy? And since when do they have more than one invention?
That would be the Nobel Peace Prize, which is awarded by a separate entity (I believe the Norwegian Parliament) and is therefore under seperate rules.
Unless you're suggesting that Ms. Franklin should be awarded a Peace Prize for her work on DNA, it doesn't really apply.
Click Click.
I would like to take this moment to recommend Francis Crick's The Astonishing Hypothesis to anyone interested in cognitive science. Although the theory of consciousness he espouses is somewhat uninteresting, the book does provide a good overview of the mechanisms by which the human brain functions, and it also describes the field of Cog Sci to some depth.
Where the developers make no attempt at finding bugs.
Backdoors, anyone?
CSharpMinor's Recent Submissions
9 020357,39160027,00.htm
5 31&cid=5&cname=Asia+%26+Pacific
Title Datestamp
Japanese Primary Schools to Tag Students with RFID Sunday July 11, @09:12PM Rejected
Methinks I dislike Michael.
I had more links, to boot.
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/emergingtech/0,3
http://www.nbr.co.nz/home/column_article.asp?id=9
I think CNN had a story, too, but I can't find it.
I would be alarmed by that article if most of it were even misleading instead of simply false.
The Price-Andersen Act simply allows the government to act as an insurance broker for nuclear power plants. The plants PAY for the insurance, and it only covers small accidents-- maximum liability for the government is something like $10 million. Furthermore, the act allows for priave companies to step in to take over the insurace after a period of some years-- something that private companies have indeed done. (The PA Act has actually made taxpayers money, as plants have paid out more than they have received, just like any successful insurance company. So it doesn't count as subsidy at all.)
As for the "$66 billion" figure, that's even worse. They mean, "The military has spent $66 billion researching nuclear reactors for their own use between 1948 and 1998."
Nuclear power does receive some subsidies, but not many-- especially compared to wind and solar, which are absolutely not cost effective. Coal, the second cheapest method of generating electricity (next to nuclear, unremarkably), receives over a billion dollars a year from the federal government just to support miners who have developed black lung disease. Oil receives billions as well. In fact, anything you can name receives more money than nuclear.
Nuclear power is not popular, and politicians know it. If nuclear power really received these nefarious subsidies, every senator in Congress would be biting at it so s/he could claim to be "fighting for safer power." Do you really think any member of Congress could pass up the chance to guarantee re-election?
(PS-- solar has some nasty hazardous waste products. The panels themselves are about as toxic as cyanide, as measured by LD50, and generous amounts of arsenic are produced as a result of the doping process of the silicon panels. Furthermore, when solar panels electromigrate, that's it-- if you try to recycle them, you end up using more energy than you got out of the panel in the first place. Those shiny toxic squares have to be thrown away.)
IANANT,BIASTGMOLAARR (Not a nuclear technician, but I am studying to get my operator's license at a research reactor.)
Apparently, the probability of the word 'sausage' appearing was still pretty good.
Can I expect to get sued by Amazon the next time I remodel to use "One-Turn(tm) Opening" doors?
How long until someone literally patents the kitchen sink?
"...and will support e-government initiatives and a more productive mobile workforce."
Let's see how many buzzwords we can pack into that last dependent clause:
"...and will grow e-civil management initiatives and will improve the morale of the mindshare in a more immersive global knowledge worker production environment."
Mod Interesting or Underrated, help my karma.
I know someone who's a convicted felon. Want to know what the conviction is for? Graffiti.
That's right, he sprayed graffiti on someone's house when he was 18 and now he's a felon for life. And he gets a DNA sample taken.
How about people with more than $200 of pot on them? People who accidentally cut fiberoptic cables while digging in their backyards?
Do people not realize how idiotic laws are in this country? More than 30 states still consider it a felony to have sex out of wedlock!
The only remarkable thing about this story is that they placed second worst.
Want to know what the cost of food is? It's the cost of manufacturing fertilizer (energy); tilling land and fueling tractors (energy); planting seeds with big machines (energy); harvesting, processing and shipping food (energy); refrigerating it (energy); and paying people to do all those things (most of whose incomes exist so that they have money to pay for the energy to buy their own food).
Your $1400/month salary would suddenly feel like $800/month at best.
Oh, and wind and solar cost more than twice nuclear. (Remember that wind and solar work best in certain choice locations; if we switched over to all solar or wind, we'd run out of locations in a hurry.)
I had NOTHING to do with this.
I ordered cable Internet from Charter a few years ago. The good thing was that they had someone out there in less than a week. The bad thing was everything else.
At the same time, we switched from satellite to cable TV. Just in case Charter had problems, I told them NOT to remove the satellite dish. At some point during the install, he decided to use the coax coming off the dish-- which he pulled out of the wall, leaving a hole in my garage's wall. Furthermore, he hit the dish-- hard-- and dented it, rendering it worthless.
I wasn't home at the time, and I knew he'd need to access my computer, so I set up an administrator account on Windows for him. (Hey, It was 2001, I hadn't switched to Linux yet.) I left this note for him, exactly these words: "username: Charterguy; no password." It's probably a good thing that he couldn't figure out what "no password" meant, seeing as he would have ruined my computer if he got onto it. (Of course, he left without running any cables or installing the modem, because he couldn't log on to my computer.)
And, just to add insult to injury, that night, when I went to sleep, I could swear that I was hearing voices! Turns out, he left his radio in my attic. (And those radios last for days on a charge if you only listen on them without transmitting.) I never did find it, so for the next three days, I slept to the sound of field calls.
Mod Interesting, I need karma.
Notice that the eighth result is Google's Linux search.
Don't forget the 55-gallon-drum ink cartridges.
From a MS ad embeeded in the article:
"Windows Server 2003 offers a savings of 11-22% over Linux in 4 out of 5 workplace scenarios."
From the text of the article:
"The company said in a 2001 Securities and Exchange Commission filing that Linux cut its technology expenses by $16 million, or 25 percent."
The US relies heavily (entirely?) on "terminator" mines that deactivate themselves after a certain period of time, say a few days or months. They started this in Vietnam so that they wouldn't have to worry about clearing their own minefields.
It doesn't make them totally safe, but it still eliminates 90% of the danger associated with landmines.
This is wrong, not insightful. We already have naval fuel tankers, and we already have nuclear reactors on EVERY DAMN SHIP THAT'S BIG ENOUGH TO HOLD ONE. The only difference between hydrogen and the hydrocarbon fuels we already lug around is that hydrogen causes less damage when it burns. (And it burns, not explodes.)
We haven't had any of the trouble he's forecasting.
1) Make sure you're running Linux or another POSIX.
2) Install XMMS.
3) Right-click your playlist, select "Add>URL."
4) Type "tone://18000"
5) Play the tone.
That's 18 kHz. At this response rate, you can hear a clear beat frequency (meaning that it sounds like the volume is rising and falling rhythmically).
Note that the most popular film search on Google for the Netherlands wasn't LOTR, the Matrix, or Finding Nemo; it was 2 Fast 2 Furious.
The iPod doesn't "already do this."
The iPod recognizes two different kinds of files: data, which are files stored using the iPod as a removable drive and that can be transferred to any computer of your choice; and music, which are loaded onto the iPod through iTunes/Musicmatch/whatever and that cannot be transferred to a different computer.
You can load anything as data (including MP3s and AACs), but the iPod will only play files loaded as music.
So no, it certainly doesn't "already do this."
Once again, I have to pimp eMusic:
Unprotected VBR MP3 at 128-320kbps. It's better than geeksex.
eMusic == indy labels and deals made with artists directly
I picked a stance, and I'm sticking with it.
WEATHER != CLIMATE
The difference between predicting the climate and predicting the weather is the same as the difference between predicting if anyone will win the lottery and predicting the winning numbers.