A large percentage of the drug trade in Africa is based on fake drugs with little or no benifit, they are manafactured in India and other developing nations. Drug companies are certainly not saints either, they have been known to conduct trials there because the locals are cheap, ignorant and will swallow anything you put in their mouth.
To the people harping on that Africa is overpoulated, news flash, the whole world is overpopulated, eg: Europe has roughly the same population as Africa. That does not excuse the way we continue to kick the spindly ribs of the downtrodden on this planet, the only word I can find for it is "inhumane", but humanity is both the victim and the villan.
As the summary noted there has also been a rapid political shift in Australia, A few weeks ago I watched an interview with our environment minister and could not belive it was the same person who inhabited that body a year ago. However I think the most significant shift in opinion has been Rupert Murdoch "turning green", I also think Tony Blair deserves an honourable mention for the current u-turn towards "greener" politics.
OTOH: The political shift in Australia could be due to the "worst drought in 1000yrs" or some other anecdote, such as today's news where we saw snow falling around bushfires! For those unfimilair with Australia, snow in November is a rare occurence, it's happened twice in the last month along with a record breaking heatwave in October that reached 37C in Melbourne.
On a more somber note: Currenty we have culled 20% of our dairy heard and reduced our forecast grain harvest by 50%. The markets are flooded with malnourished livestock, the antarctic blasts and the associated frost has ruined our fruit and wine crops, and our bannanas are still recovering from a cyclone that wiped them off the map earlier this year.
I understand our agricultural problems are not all directly caused by AGW but it certainly isn't helping the situation (except maybe for snowing on bushfires).
Speaking of agriculture it is difficult to get much in the way of historical data (last 20yrs) for total world harvests without paying a few hundred bucks, anyone got a link?
Not that we hear a lot about that part of the world but I had heard there is plenty of symapthy from the locals, however the official policy is to send them back. Some end up in Thailand where (I hear) they are given refugee status.
Funny that the same people who point to alleged climate change on Mars and Venus as a metaphor for Earth's climate also belive there is not enough evidence to support AGW on Earth.
Accepting flimsy evidence from studying different planets and claiming it refutes strong evidence from studying the Earth is neither science nor common-sense.
So what motivates these people to jump on the discredited "solar" band wagon?
As the GP pointed out realclimate has plenty of esoteric and usefull data, their discussion of "how much CO2 is too much" can be found here.
I don't see how Mars or Venus can give us insights into Earth's current climate, Mars barely has an atmosphere, Venus has a surface temprature hot enough to melt lead, neither have an ocean. The red herring of variable solar forcing is also debunked on realclimate if you care enough to find it for yourself.
There will never (and can never) be precise enough answers to staisfy all comers, but we do know (to a very high degree of certainty) the outcome will be bad if we continue with "business as usual". Ressurecting old and invalid arguments on slashdot will not change that prediction.
"So far the only proof we have that co2 is linked to global warming[...blah, blah, blah,..]"
The "proof" comes from hard core physics, ie: the absorption spectra of CO2 molecules. Throw that out and you also have to throw out a lot of our notions about physics in general.
I find it sad that unsubstaniated dribble such as you post is modded +5 insightfull when there is such a wealth of information available to debunk such claims. However I do agree we are not certain about the effects on humans and the environment and therefore must look for the most likely outcomes rather than the extreme outcomes at either end.
Just for the record, Roger Pielke (Jr.) supports the very lowest end of estimates, he is at odds with most climate scientists on the issue of solar forcing but is at least arguing from a scientific viewpoint and not a political one. He often posts interesting comments and questions on the realclimate site.
Interesting you call the argument for AGW a religion, yet you use other peoples discredited objections to support the argument against it, further more you don't even link to anything that would proffess to support your "religion".
I will give you a hand in the link department. You will find all the myths you quoted debunked here. Also you will find the novelist Crichton is in a state of confusion over most things scientific. Lastly the predictions quoted in the origial article and credited to Hannsen are bald faced lies, if you want an accurate prediction that has come true (so far) go back and study at the "most likely" extrapolations of the original "hockey stick" graph by Mann (published in the early 80's and widely available on the net).
"Science is not about consensus (which is a political thing) nor is it about an appeal to authority (which is a religious thing) but about data and the conclusions that can be drawn from that data."
You are confusing science with absolute truth, there is no such thing. Scientific "fact" is by definition a consensus amongst scientists on a particular question, the consensus can be wrong and any scientist worth his title will support a valid argument against it. The problem with both evolution and the earth's climate is not the science itself but a bunch of crackpots who (due to religion, politics or greed) attempt to shout down the consesus with arguments that were thouroughly discredited years ago.
CO2 and the ocean: The ocean is a net sink for CO2, leading to fears that it could become too acidic for the phytoplankton that convert CO2 into sediment, it's effect on climate is a hell of a lot more complex than releasing CO2 from a can of beer.
It should be such that a BSc in any field gives one the basic capacity to sort the shit from the clay when faced with conflicting scientific claims. This is the normal outcome for psuedo-science posted on/. The exception to this is the environment and earth sciences, on this subject many of the early posts contain a similar form of logic to flat-earthers and creationists (see first post for a shining example). This is not because of a failure amoungst/.ers to understand science but rather a success for industry propoganda, astroturfers and fools. Come back to the article in a few days (when the mods are finished), read at +4 and you will see that a bunch of computer nerds do indeed understand the basics of climate science.
A BSc certaily does not give you knowledge about the climate but it should give you the ability to recognise and debunk psuedo-science when it smacks you in the face.
Disclaimer: I have a general interest in science and a BSc in computer science, I use this site ( > 1% climatoligists ) to help me with any unfamiliar concepts peculiar to climate science.
The DMZ is chock full of bobby traps and mines and is the deadly place on the planet, for a human. The flourishing wildlife of the DMZ demonstrates how deadly humans are to the environment. Note that they can only be planted along the border, unless you are willing to risk entering the DMZ? The critters will soon learn to run.
They were shooting N. Korean refugees at the same time as helping the DDR refugees. The policy has not changed in Korea, that is why the few N. Korean refugees that manage to escape do so via China.
"simple decisions like 'Is this a person?' and 'Is this person an enemy?' and 'Is this person armed?'"
...are not required. The DMZ does not have people wandering around the undergrowth, even with human gaurds you will be shot (armed or otherwise). All it needs to sense is a warm object.
Just a minor nitpick but asbestos has been known to cause lung problems for about 100yrs now. The only thing that changed was someone proved it in court in order to get those responsible to "cough up" (bad pun intended).
Al Gore is communicating climate science to lay people, sure he is not as good at it as Carl Sagan was with cosmology but he does deserve some recognition for his efforts.
No, the OP said the software is given away under a license who's terms must be obeyed, one of the license terms GRANTS you permission for unrestricted USE. If someone has given it to you without the license then they are breaking the terms of the license.
Semantics does not come into it, however comprehension and clear communication does.
Heh, it sure would. It's quite freaky how easy it is for a taxi driver to intimidate his passengers and other drivers, I'm a "big guy" and in general avoid standing on snails. Simply standing up with one hand hidden behind the drivers door was enough to turn "road ragers" around 180 degrees. No taxi drivers carry handguns here in Australia, but most have those black metal tourches that use 4 'D' cell batteries lined up in the long handle, you know, the ones the cops use with that akward-looking but extremely effective reverse hold.
I agree. My adult daughter says that everyone she meets automatically gets "10 points of respect" from her as a "good will" gesture, after that it is up to them to increase/decrease their "respect score" by their deeds.
A uniform shows people you have some sort of authority, it doesn't teach you how to use that authority wisely.
I think "international observers" is a more accurate term, since they judge the "fairness" of the election, even if they wanted to they don't have the power to regulate elections.
The idea espoused by the GP is to set up a bunch of public servants that use well understood principles and procedures to run a "fair election". The important part when setting up such an authority is to give them enough teeth to make them independent of political whims. It's not a new idea, it is already done for the reserve bank, weights and measures, and other essential bipartisan services. Australia has such a system and it works, they sent diebold packing when they tried peddling their paperless machines over here.
Yes it's the same in many other industries, a long time ago I drove a taxi for a living, taxi users quite often expect the driver to know exactly how to get to their street and get impatient if the driver has to look it up in the street directory. I used to tell them "I don't get paid enough to memorise 40,000 streets", nowadays I tell scope-creepers "We will have to estimate the impact" and let the PHB's argue about the costs.
The best PM I ever worked for often said "if we don't find any problems we are not doing our job". The moral is don't let shitty customers and PHB's turn you from a proffesional into a code monkey that simply follows orders, make it clear that you won't put up with their crap and if they are not going to be "part of the team" it will take longer, cost more and the end product will be a dissapointment.
As far as business is concerned there are two problems in commercial software development, time and money. People hire (experienced) software engineers because they don't have the expertise themselves, they expect you to know what you are doing and to be able to point out project roadblocks before they become a big time and/or money problem. If you do this and the project fails it is the PHB's/customers fault, if you don't do it and it fails it's your fault.
TFA: I graduated as a mature age student in 1991 (and quit driving cabs), our final year in the software engineering subject was spent on two projects, one semester working on a project with a group of fellow students and one semester working one day a week at an approved commercial/government project.
My health cover costs 1.5% of my taxable income, prescriptions are capped at $1200/yr, that includes any dependents I might have. Everyone is automatically covered and on a recent trip to the UK I found our govt has an arrangement whereby I am covered there also. The hospitals, doctors, drugs and medical research are all world class. Cosmetic surgery and dentistry is not covered, but if a doctor says your dick is broken and that viagra will fix it, you are covered.
The prescription system has been running since the 50's and UHC since the 70's, the dire predictions about catastrophic budget blow outs never came to fruition, the conservatives stop fighting it long ago. If any country can afford top quality UHC it should be the one with the world's biggest economy but I see it differently in that I don't know how you guys can afford not to have it. As I said: if it works people will vote for it, but it takes a true leader to challenge the status-quo in the first place.
I have met many gay's and christians that I have liked and a few that profoundly irritated me. Gay's and many other groups do provocative things to bring attention to what they feel are inequalities. As someone who is neither gay nor religious, I try to look at these things from an ideological level and I firmly belive in the "all men are created equal" mantra. I hope the clergy can look into their hearts and practice some more of the tolerance they preach, but I wouldn't support any government attacking their "dignity" by forcing them to do so.
Disclaimer: I do realise there are way more "good things" about the US than there are not so "good things", the same can be said for the conservative government over here.
Slashdot Mirror
A large percentage of the drug trade in Africa is based on fake drugs with little or no benifit, they are manafactured in India and other developing nations. Drug companies are certainly not saints either, they have been known to conduct trials there because the locals are cheap, ignorant and will swallow anything you put in their mouth.
To the people harping on that Africa is overpoulated, news flash, the whole world is overpopulated, eg: Europe has roughly the same population as Africa. That does not excuse the way we continue to kick the spindly ribs of the downtrodden on this planet, the only word I can find for it is "inhumane", but humanity is both the victim and the villan.
As the summary noted there has also been a rapid political shift in Australia, A few weeks ago I watched an interview with our environment minister and could not belive it was the same person who inhabited that body a year ago. However I think the most significant shift in opinion has been Rupert Murdoch "turning green", I also think Tony Blair deserves an honourable mention for the current u-turn towards "greener" politics.
OTOH: The political shift in Australia could be due to the "worst drought in 1000yrs" or some other anecdote, such as today's news where we saw snow falling around bushfires! For those unfimilair with Australia, snow in November is a rare occurence, it's happened twice in the last month along with a record breaking heatwave in October that reached 37C in Melbourne.
On a more somber note: Currenty we have culled 20% of our dairy heard and reduced our forecast grain harvest by 50%. The markets are flooded with malnourished livestock, the antarctic blasts and the associated frost has ruined our fruit and wine crops, and our bannanas are still recovering from a cyclone that wiped them off the map earlier this year. I understand our agricultural problems are not all directly caused by AGW but it certainly isn't helping the situation (except maybe for snowing on bushfires).
Speaking of agriculture it is difficult to get much in the way of historical data (last 20yrs) for total world harvests without paying a few hundred bucks, anyone got a link?
Not that we hear a lot about that part of the world but I had heard there is plenty of symapthy from the locals, however the official policy is to send them back. Some end up in Thailand where (I hear) they are given refugee status.
Funny that the same people who point to alleged climate change on Mars and Venus as a metaphor for Earth's climate also belive there is not enough evidence to support AGW on Earth.
Accepting flimsy evidence from studying different planets and claiming it refutes strong evidence from studying the Earth is neither science nor common-sense.
So what motivates these people to jump on the discredited "solar" band wagon?
As the GP pointed out realclimate has plenty of esoteric and usefull data, their discussion of "how much CO2 is too much" can be found here.
I don't see how Mars or Venus can give us insights into Earth's current climate, Mars barely has an atmosphere, Venus has a surface temprature hot enough to melt lead, neither have an ocean. The red herring of variable solar forcing is also debunked on realclimate if you care enough to find it for yourself.
There will never (and can never) be precise enough answers to staisfy all comers, but we do know (to a very high degree of certainty) the outcome will be bad if we continue with "business as usual". Ressurecting old and invalid arguments on slashdot will not change that prediction.
"So far the only proof we have that co2 is linked to global warming[...blah, blah, blah,..]"
The "proof" comes from hard core physics, ie: the absorption spectra of CO2 molecules. Throw that out and you also have to throw out a lot of our notions about physics in general.
I find it sad that unsubstaniated dribble such as you post is modded +5 insightfull when there is such a wealth of information available to debunk such claims. However I do agree we are not certain about the effects on humans and the environment and therefore must look for the most likely outcomes rather than the extreme outcomes at either end.
Nobody has a reason to be inside the DMZ, that is why both sides already shoot at whatever moves inside it.
Just for the record, Roger Pielke (Jr.) supports the very lowest end of estimates, he is at odds with most climate scientists on the issue of solar forcing but is at least arguing from a scientific viewpoint and not a political one. He often posts interesting comments and questions on the realclimate site.
Interesting you call the argument for AGW a religion, yet you use other peoples discredited objections to support the argument against it, further more you don't even link to anything that would proffess to support your "religion".
I will give you a hand in the link department. You will find all the myths you quoted debunked here. Also you will find the novelist Crichton is in a state of confusion over most things scientific. Lastly the predictions quoted in the origial article and credited to Hannsen are bald faced lies, if you want an accurate prediction that has come true (so far) go back and study at the "most likely" extrapolations of the original "hockey stick" graph by Mann (published in the early 80's and widely available on the net).
"Science is not about consensus (which is a political thing) nor is it about an appeal to authority (which is a religious thing) but about data and the conclusions that can be drawn from that data."
You are confusing science with absolute truth, there is no such thing. Scientific "fact" is by definition a consensus amongst scientists on a particular question, the consensus can be wrong and any scientist worth his title will support a valid argument against it. The problem with both evolution and the earth's climate is not the science itself but a bunch of crackpots who (due to religion, politics or greed) attempt to shout down the consesus with arguments that were thouroughly discredited years ago.
CO2 and the ocean: The ocean is a net sink for CO2, leading to fears that it could become too acidic for the phytoplankton that convert CO2 into sediment, it's effect on climate is a hell of a lot more complex than releasing CO2 from a can of beer.
"Slashdot contains less that 1% climatologists"
/. The exception to this is the environment and earth sciences, on this subject many of the early posts contain a similar form of logic to flat-earthers and creationists (see first post for a shining example). This is not because of a failure amoungst /.ers to understand science but rather a success for industry propoganda, astroturfers and fools. Come back to the article in a few days (when the mods are finished), read at +4 and you will see that a bunch of computer nerds do indeed understand the basics of climate science.
It should be such that a BSc in any field gives one the basic capacity to sort the shit from the clay when faced with conflicting scientific claims. This is the normal outcome for psuedo-science posted on
A BSc certaily does not give you knowledge about the climate but it should give you the ability to recognise and debunk psuedo-science when it smacks you in the face.
Disclaimer: I have a general interest in science and a BSc in computer science, I use this site ( > 1% climatoligists ) to help me with any unfamiliar concepts peculiar to climate science.
The DMZ is chock full of bobby traps and mines and is the deadly place on the planet, for a human. The flourishing wildlife of the DMZ demonstrates how deadly humans are to the environment. Note that they can only be planted along the border, unless you are willing to risk entering the DMZ? The critters will soon learn to run.
They were shooting N. Korean refugees at the same time as helping the DDR refugees. The policy has not changed in Korea, that is why the few N. Korean refugees that manage to escape do so via China.
"simple decisions like 'Is this a person?' and 'Is this person an enemy?' and 'Is this person armed?'"
...are not required. The DMZ does not have people wandering around the undergrowth, even with human gaurds you will be shot (armed or otherwise). All it needs to sense is a warm object.
"think asbestos"
Just a minor nitpick but asbestos has been known to cause lung problems for about 100yrs now. The only thing that changed was someone proved it in court in order to get those responsible to "cough up" (bad pun intended).
Al Gore is communicating climate science to lay people, sure he is not as good at it as Carl Sagan was with cosmology but he does deserve some recognition for his efforts.
No, the OP said the software is given away under a license who's terms must be obeyed, one of the license terms GRANTS you permission for unrestricted USE. If someone has given it to you without the license then they are breaking the terms of the license.
Semantics does not come into it, however comprehension and clear communication does.
Yes, but this does not give potential bead tossers the right to modify the free balcony boobs with silicon.
"Um, no."
Um, yes.
"If you don't follow these rules, you can't give it to others."
Regardless of what the "rules" actually say, how is your muddled post different to what the GP said?
Heh, it sure would. It's quite freaky how easy it is for a taxi driver to intimidate his passengers and other drivers, I'm a "big guy" and in general avoid standing on snails. Simply standing up with one hand hidden behind the drivers door was enough to turn "road ragers" around 180 degrees. No taxi drivers carry handguns here in Australia, but most have those black metal tourches that use 4 'D' cell batteries lined up in the long handle, you know, the ones the cops use with that akward-looking but extremely effective reverse hold.
I agree. My adult daughter says that everyone she meets automatically gets "10 points of respect" from her as a "good will" gesture, after that it is up to them to increase/decrease their "respect score" by their deeds.
A uniform shows people you have some sort of authority, it doesn't teach you how to use that authority wisely.
I think "international observers" is a more accurate term, since they judge the "fairness" of the election, even if they wanted to they don't have the power to regulate elections.
The idea espoused by the GP is to set up a bunch of public servants that use well understood principles and procedures to run a "fair election". The important part when setting up such an authority is to give them enough teeth to make them independent of political whims. It's not a new idea, it is already done for the reserve bank, weights and measures, and other essential bipartisan services. Australia has such a system and it works, they sent diebold packing when they tried peddling their paperless machines over here.
Yep, and don't forget people have been using proxies at auctions for centuries and nobody is complaining.
"Still, it is perfectly possible for a rational person to buy a scalped console, and really have that be the best value for them."
Such as tech magazines who want to be "first" with an independent review.
Yes it's the same in many other industries, a long time ago I drove a taxi for a living, taxi users quite often expect the driver to know exactly how to get to their street and get impatient if the driver has to look it up in the street directory. I used to tell them "I don't get paid enough to memorise 40,000 streets", nowadays I tell scope-creepers "We will have to estimate the impact" and let the PHB's argue about the costs.
The best PM I ever worked for often said "if we don't find any problems we are not doing our job". The moral is don't let shitty customers and PHB's turn you from a proffesional into a code monkey that simply follows orders, make it clear that you won't put up with their crap and if they are not going to be "part of the team" it will take longer, cost more and the end product will be a dissapointment.
As far as business is concerned there are two problems in commercial software development, time and money. People hire (experienced) software engineers because they don't have the expertise themselves, they expect you to know what you are doing and to be able to point out project roadblocks before they become a big time and/or money problem. If you do this and the project fails it is the PHB's/customers fault, if you don't do it and it fails it's your fault.
TFA: I graduated as a mature age student in 1991 (and quit driving cabs), our final year in the software engineering subject was spent on two projects, one semester working on a project with a group of fellow students and one semester working one day a week at an approved commercial/government project.
My health cover costs 1.5% of my taxable income, prescriptions are capped at $1200/yr, that includes any dependents I might have. Everyone is automatically covered and on a recent trip to the UK I found our govt has an arrangement whereby I am covered there also. The hospitals, doctors, drugs and medical research are all world class. Cosmetic surgery and dentistry is not covered, but if a doctor says your dick is broken and that viagra will fix it, you are covered.
The prescription system has been running since the 50's and UHC since the 70's, the dire predictions about catastrophic budget blow outs never came to fruition, the conservatives stop fighting it long ago. If any country can afford top quality UHC it should be the one with the world's biggest economy but I see it differently in that I don't know how you guys can afford not to have it. As I said: if it works people will vote for it, but it takes a true leader to challenge the status-quo in the first place.
I have met many gay's and christians that I have liked and a few that profoundly irritated me. Gay's and many other groups do provocative things to bring attention to what they feel are inequalities. As someone who is neither gay nor religious, I try to look at these things from an ideological level and I firmly belive in the "all men are created equal" mantra. I hope the clergy can look into their hearts and practice some more of the tolerance they preach, but I wouldn't support any government attacking their "dignity" by forcing them to do so.
Disclaimer: I do realise there are way more "good things" about the US than there are not so "good things", the same can be said for the conservative government over here.