Geologically hundreds of thousands of years is meaningless however to a human the next 100 or 1000 years are very important.
There is a lot of credible evidence to suggest that the rate of warming over the last 100 years or so is greater than we would expect it to be, there is credible evidence suggesting this could be caused by the Industrial Revolution and our current industrial age.
Maybe the science is wrong, maybe there is nothing we can do to prevent it but we're going to feel pretty stupid if it does turn out to be true and we didn't do a thing about it.
You're totally wrong. It's no pseudoscience, it's science fact.
Some types of rock retain the direction of the prevailing magnetic field at the time they were formed, examining these rocks from periods of time spanning millions of years clearly shows the polarity at the time the rocks were formed reverses on a regular basis.
No one said it was caused by humans, it isn't and there's nothing we can do about it.
It's caused ( I think ) by Earths core which acts like a dynamo due to the molten metal swirling around, every so often the swirling motion changes and the field reverses.
There is strong evidence to suggest the Earths Magnetic field is beginning to display increasingly large areas with localised changes to the field direction and strength which is what has been predicted to happen in the run up to a reversal.
Birmingham is high enough to avoid any but the most extreme sea level increases and I can tell you we are all looking forward to becoming the Capital city and forcing the UK to take up our lovely accent.
Maybe the Chinese are sitting there saying to themselves:
"The US is a much more advanced nation than us and it is making no attempt to reform it's energy policies so why should we ?"
China is still very much a developing country and cannot alter it's infrastructure as easily as the US and other developed countries can so it's only fair we should take the lead.
I agree, I'm thick but I can use Linux and solve all the little problems which come along ( setting up Bluetooth to sync my phone etc ) provided I can google for information about what I should be doing. It's only where there is no info that things start getting awkward. In fairness though it almost never happens that Google Groups doesn't come back with at least 1 answer for my question.
I like your points about farmers and their independance but I'm not sure about this one:
"The worst thing, is if you piss off the farmer, YOU starve. He'll just let his crop rot. He's got enough for his family to eat. This isn't a good thing for government bureaucrats."
I think what would in fact happen is that the farmer let's his crops rot we import food from elsewhere albeit at a more realistic price.
The worst job I ever had was whilst I was waiting for a proper job to come along. As soon as I laid eyes on my new office I knew I was in trouble, it was in the worst part of Birmingham in a poky flat above an Alarm & Security shop. I considered turning away then and there and going home but stupidly I persevered and went in to meet my new colleagues.
There were 4 of them, most elderly ladies who had clearly been working in there since the war and a scary kick boxing psyhcopath type who I just steered well clear of.
The work was mind numbingly monotonous, Monday - put letters in Envelopes, Tuesday - enter new business into computer, Wednesday - generate new letters, Thursday - open letters received and file them, Friday - put things in bags, prepare letters for post on Monday.
Even worse the old people naturally assumed that everyone worked in exactly the same way they had done and would automatically know that at 10:17 and every 83.5 minutes afterwards it was my turn to make the drinks, that everyone filed documents based on the Forename and not the Surname etc etc. They'd never bother to tell you beforehand they were expecting you to do things, they would just moan about it afterwards ( all day ) when you didn't do it.
The worst part about was this company went from door to door offering people loans, loans at 186% APR. Obviously most of the people taking the loans were not the brightest of people and pretty poor so the worst part of the job was them phoning up saying things like:
"When's the maaan coming ? I need me money now" "I don't know, we have no way of telling where they are" "But I'm taking me kids on holiday in 20mins and I need me cash... etc etc"
Dreadful. For the last 2 weeks I signed all the letters as "Count Von Dracula", eventually they noticed and were very upset so I left. 3 weeks later the agency I who had consigned me this hell called up asking me to go back to work there because no one else they had sent lasted more than 2 days - I said no.
I am British and I can tell you that no one I have ever heard over here is suggesting that that would be a good idea.
The average Brit on the street would probably rather burn their umbrella's or throw away their tea rather than consider such a horrible suggestion.
I suspect the only time 'commentators' make this suggestion is as a part of the endless "join European Superstate / don't join European Superstate" type discussions. I'm sure that much as people might not like Europe they would still rather be a part of that than the USA if they had to make a choice between one or the other.
We like going on holiday to the US because we can but tons of cheap stuff once we convert our GBP's and we like Americans on the whole but there is no way on Earth we would let you anywhere near running ( ruining ? ) our lives or our country.
It's true I work for one of those Outsourcing companies, an large international one in fact, and I can confirm that so far as the overall management is concerned actually fixing problems is way down the list of priorities.
Last week I was present at a discussion where they were seriously suggesting that if anyone was queuing to talk to someone for over 20 seconds we should just cut them off and let them call back because our 'stats' would look better that way. They totally fail to realise that people who have a problem with their computer and can't use it are just going to call back straight away and keep on calling until they speak to someone.
Once you have got through to them the main aim is basically to get rid of you in under 3 mins which means they analyst is only concerned about getting enough information to pass the call onto one of the 2nd line teams, most people expect immediate help which the analysts can't offer so because most users accept stuff like "check the power cable, reboot the PC" as being an actual soloution analysts suggest it to shut them up, stop them moaning nothing is being done etc.
It's interesting to see a lot of companies which jumped into the whole Call Centre idea are now realising customers are just fed with them and are advertising things like no automated IVR's, talk to one person who will fix your problem not dozens of clueless intermediaries, this is a good thing in my opinion.
I agree too, not necessarily with Office Suites but there's a lot of applications we use which do *almost* exactly what we need to fit in with our processes.
If I could spend the time working out how to change the bits I need changing rather than working our convlouted and painful workarounds I think everyone would be better off. For example one of our reporting packages extremely annoyingly chooses to pick, apparently, random names for the output files it saves - if I could change that I would have saved myself a world of pain.
That's a very good point, I can remember playing games like Elite on my BBC and also playing it on my friends Spectrum. I'm sure it was available for alot more platforms than that as well.
Personally I was waiting for the BBC's successor the Archimedes which I thought looked excellent but unfortunatley my Dad, who called the shots at the time, bought a PC instead. So far as I could see the Archimedes did everything the PC could do and was a lot better but what I do know, I was only a kid.
Well maybe but I'm sure the US forces would have wiped out a good 2/3rds of their own side in 'friendly' fire by the time they got half away across the Atlantic.
There's a lot of people saying that because the people downloading these files have been breaking the law they deserve everything they get.
So far as I can see though they haven't actually broken the law themselves. They have downloaded a file with a particular name, this file is not illegal to download or use on your computers so I don't see any crime being commited there.
On the other hands the program writers are almost certainly breaking the law by running spyware etc on your computer without your permission.
I'm not saying I agree with stealing stuff of P2P because I don't but I am saying that in the case the downloader has done nothing wrong.
You're right, that was of course exactly what I meant.
Ever since I made that post the error has been glaringly obvious to me and it has caused me some considerable despair and annoyance knowing that I was powerless to correct my error.
I was hoping it would go unoticed and I would survive with some vestiges of my respect and honour intact, it was not to be and for that I am sad.
I do not blame you, Pieroxy, you have only done what any man would do in your position. You have even tried to be kind about it but how were you to know this is not the first time I have made a mistake of this kind ?
Few people know about the previous shameful occurences of my shortcoming, my colleagues were unaware of the reason behind my sudden departure and even my boss, suffering from my dreadful error, couldn't keep his job. I haven't worked since, my CV is the work of an illiterate - who would employ me now ? And now that my shame is illuminated for the scorn of millions I fear my life is over.
I couldn't agree more, if you weren't +5 already I would have modded you up.
If policies don't make sense and those in charge won't listen to you telling them they don't make sense the best plan is to illustrate your point as graphically as possible so they get flack and hopefully learn there lesson.
Yeah but Joe User will never go for that, why would he want to spend time reading techie manuals when Linux just takes care of this for him. XP will never be ready for the desktop so long as they ignore their users like this.
Slashdot Mirror
Geologically hundreds of thousands of years is meaningless however to a human the next 100 or 1000 years are very important.
There is a lot of credible evidence to suggest that the rate of warming over the last 100 years or so is greater than we would expect it to be, there is credible evidence suggesting this could be caused by the Industrial Revolution and our current industrial age.
Maybe the science is wrong, maybe there is nothing we can do to prevent it but we're going to feel pretty stupid if it does turn out to be true and we didn't do a thing about it.
You're totally wrong. It's no pseudoscience, it's science fact.
Some types of rock retain the direction of the prevailing magnetic field at the time they were formed, examining these rocks from periods of time spanning millions of years clearly shows the polarity at the time the rocks were formed reverses on a regular basis.
No one said it was caused by humans, it isn't and there's nothing we can do about it.
It's caused ( I think ) by Earths core which acts like a dynamo due to the molten metal swirling around, every so often the swirling motion changes and the field reverses.
There is strong evidence to suggest the Earths Magnetic field is beginning to display increasingly large areas with localised changes to the field direction and strength which is what has been predicted to happen in the run up to a reversal.
It protects us from Cosmic Rays ( maaan ) and as it is reversing it will not offer as much protection as it normally does.
This isn't going to be a huge problem though, it may cause a bit more skin cancer etc but we can just buy more sunscreen.
Birmingham is high enough to avoid any but the most extreme sea level increases and I can tell you we are all looking forward to becoming the Capital city and forcing the UK to take up our lovely accent.
A lot of the Glaciers and ice caps aren't floating in the North Pole they are sitting on Greenland and the Antarctic continent.
Maybe the Chinese are sitting there saying to themselves:
"The US is a much more advanced nation than us and it is making no attempt to reform it's energy policies so why should we ?"
China is still very much a developing country and cannot alter it's infrastructure as easily as the US and other developed countries can so it's only fair we should take the lead.
Old people, and girls.
In the UK too it is considered weird to drive an Automatic, almost everyone learns to drive Manual. I think it's the same in most of Europe as well.
I agree, I'm thick but I can use Linux and solve all the little problems which come along ( setting up Bluetooth to sync my phone etc ) provided I can google for information about what I should be doing. It's only where there is no info that things start getting awkward. In fairness though it almost never happens that Google Groups doesn't come back with at least 1 answer for my question.
You could 'talk' ? We had to bang out our messages on our chests and then carve pictorial representations onto the foreheads of bison.
I like your points about farmers and their independance but I'm not sure about this one:
"The worst thing, is if you piss off the farmer, YOU starve. He'll just let his crop rot. He's got enough for his family to eat. This isn't a good thing for government bureaucrats."
I think what would in fact happen is that the farmer let's his crops rot we import food from elsewhere albeit at a more realistic price.
The worst job I ever had was whilst I was waiting for a proper job to come along. As soon as I laid eyes on my new office I knew I was in trouble, it was in the worst part of Birmingham in a poky flat above an Alarm & Security shop. I considered turning away then and there and going home but stupidly I persevered and went in to meet my new colleagues.
There were 4 of them, most elderly ladies who had clearly been working in there since the war and a scary kick boxing psyhcopath type who I just steered well clear of.
The work was mind numbingly monotonous, Monday - put letters in Envelopes, Tuesday - enter new business into computer, Wednesday - generate new letters, Thursday - open letters received and file them, Friday - put things in bags, prepare letters for post on Monday.
Even worse the old people naturally assumed that everyone worked in exactly the same way they had done and would automatically know that at 10:17 and every 83.5 minutes afterwards it was my turn to make the drinks, that everyone filed documents based on the Forename and not the Surname etc etc. They'd never bother to tell you beforehand they were expecting you to do things, they would just moan about it afterwards ( all day ) when you didn't do it.
The worst part about was this company went from door to door offering people loans, loans at 186% APR. Obviously most of the people taking the loans were not the brightest of people and pretty poor so the worst part of the job was them phoning up saying things like:
"When's the maaan coming ? I need me money now"
"I don't know, we have no way of telling where they are"
"But I'm taking me kids on holiday in 20mins and I need me cash... etc etc"
Dreadful. For the last 2 weeks I signed all the letters as "Count Von Dracula", eventually they noticed and were very upset so I left. 3 weeks later the agency I who had consigned me this hell called up asking me to go back to work there because no one else they had sent lasted more than 2 days - I said no.
Why is that Flamebait ? Americans in the UK trying to use dollars to buy stuff is a reasonably common occurence.
I am British and I can tell you that no one I have ever heard over here is suggesting that that would be a good idea.
The average Brit on the street would probably rather burn their umbrella's or throw away their tea rather than consider such a horrible suggestion.
I suspect the only time 'commentators' make this suggestion is as a part of the endless "join European Superstate / don't join European Superstate" type discussions. I'm sure that much as people might not like Europe they would still rather be a part of that than the USA if they had to make a choice between one or the other.
We like going on holiday to the US because we can but tons of cheap stuff once we convert our GBP's and we like Americans on the whole but there is no way on Earth we would let you anywhere near running ( ruining ? ) our lives or our country.
It's true I work for one of those Outsourcing companies, an large international one in fact, and I can confirm that so far as the overall management is concerned actually fixing problems is way down the list of priorities.
Last week I was present at a discussion where they were seriously suggesting that if anyone was queuing to talk to someone for over 20 seconds we should just cut them off and let them call back because our 'stats' would look better that way. They totally fail to realise that people who have a problem with their computer and can't use it are just going to call back straight away and keep on calling until they speak to someone.
Once you have got through to them the main aim is basically to get rid of you in under 3 mins which means they analyst is only concerned about getting enough information to pass the call onto one of the 2nd line teams, most people expect immediate help which the analysts can't offer so because most users accept stuff like "check the power cable, reboot the PC" as being an actual soloution analysts suggest it to shut them up, stop them moaning nothing is being done etc.
It's interesting to see a lot of companies which jumped into the whole Call Centre idea are now realising customers are just fed with them and are advertising things like no automated IVR's, talk to one person who will fix your problem not dozens of clueless intermediaries, this is a good thing in my opinion.
I agree too, not necessarily with Office Suites but there's a lot of applications we use which do *almost* exactly what we need to fit in with our processes.
If I could spend the time working out how to change the bits I need changing rather than working our convlouted and painful workarounds I think everyone would be better off. For example one of our reporting packages extremely annoyingly chooses to pick, apparently, random names for the output files it saves - if I could change that I would have saved myself a world of pain.
That's a very good point, I can remember playing games like Elite on my BBC and also playing it on my friends Spectrum. I'm sure it was available for alot more platforms than that as well.
Personally I was waiting for the BBC's successor the Archimedes which I thought looked excellent but unfortunatley my Dad, who called the shots at the time, bought a PC instead. So far as I could see the Archimedes did everything the PC could do and was a lot better but what I do know, I was only a kid.
I believe they are, I read about it once and I'm think it was called 'plywood' or something like that.
Well maybe but I'm sure the US forces would have wiped out a good 2/3rds of their own side in 'friendly' fire by the time they got half away across the Atlantic.
Indeed, the point here I think is that have not actually downloaded which was illegal - they may have thought they did but in fact didn't.
So is thinking that you have committed a crime actually a crime if you didn't actually commit a crime ?
There's a lot of people saying that because the people downloading these files have been breaking the law they deserve everything they get.
So far as I can see though they haven't actually broken the law themselves. They have downloaded a file with a particular name, this file is not illegal to download or use on your computers so I don't see any crime being commited there.
On the other hands the program writers are almost certainly breaking the law by running spyware etc on your computer without your permission.
I'm not saying I agree with stealing stuff of P2P because I don't but I am saying that in the case the downloader has done nothing wrong.
You're right, that was of course exactly what I meant.
Ever since I made that post the error has been glaringly obvious to me and it has caused me some considerable despair and annoyance knowing that I was powerless to correct my error.
I was hoping it would go unoticed and I would survive with some vestiges of my respect and honour intact, it was not to be and for that I am sad.
I do not blame you, Pieroxy, you have only done what any man would do in your position. You have even tried to be kind about it but how were you to know this is not the first time I have made a mistake of this kind ?
Few people know about the previous shameful occurences of my shortcoming, my colleagues were unaware of the reason behind my sudden departure and even my boss, suffering from my dreadful error, couldn't keep his job. I haven't worked since, my CV is the work of an illiterate - who would employ me now ? And now that my shame is illuminated for the scorn of millions I fear my life is over.
Goodnight.
"...so you don't generate resentment from coworkers who think you're above the rules..."
Are you mad ? What else is the point in working in IT ?
I couldn't agree more, if you weren't +5 already I would have modded you up.
If policies don't make sense and those in charge won't listen to you telling them they don't make sense the best plan is to illustrate your point as graphically as possible so they get flack and hopefully learn there lesson.
Yeah but Joe User will never go for that, why would he want to spend time reading techie manuals when Linux just takes care of this for him. XP will never be ready for the desktop so long as they ignore their users like this.