While I am not in favor of harming animals for the sake of harming them. This statute if it goes into effect is a two sided coin. Many of the treatments that we have for human beings were first perfected on animals. Those same treatments also benefit animals. Right now, people, right or wrong, spend millions of dollars on various treatments for their pets that are basically the results of animal testing on the way to perfecting treatments for humans. If you take away that research avenue, then where will the future animal research money come from?
So yes, we will protect the chimps and what ever other animals get included, but when your cat has feline lukemia or your dog needs some type of surgery to repair something, without the research first going from animal to human, it is unlikely that those skills and techniques are going to flow backwards.
" nobody will argue that it is more efficient to ship from LA to NY via ship instead of rail. "
I'm not in a position to do the math, but I wouldn't be surprised if it is more efficient in some circumstances. A ship can move 10,000 containers. I'm guessing that is the equivilent 100+ trains.
A fully loaded cargo ship is 11,000 20ft containers. That is the equivalent of 18 to 24 trains. By the time the cargo ship gets through the Panama Canal, those trains will be unloaded onto trucks and going to their final destination.
It's important to remember that efficiency isn't measured just in miles per gallon. You have to take into account the extra distance to sale south from LA go through the canal then sale all the way back up to NY versus a more direct (although not straight) shot cross country. If the cross country route is 1/3 the distance travelled, it can burn three times the fuel per mile and still have the same fuel cost.
If you've got a container of stuff from China that needs distributing all over the US, then sure it makes sense to get it from LA. But if its purely for the east coast, then its not so clear.
If it is purely east coast, it could also go through the Suez Canal. It would be a shorter, more direct route that way depending on political tensions in the area.
Waving isn't truly simple. Look how long it takes an infant to "learn" how to to control the muscles to wave their arm. Just because we do it without thinking doesn't mean we should trivialize what a stroke victim may have to go through, even with brain implants.
That's a lot of maybe's. Do you have any numbers or cites to back your contention that say, China->LA, rail for LA->NY is more efficient than China->NY entirely by ship?
Only that LA unloads a lot more container ships than anywhere else in the US and the railroads transport those containers throughout the US. It would seem that businesses have already done the requisite analysis and found that unless the final destination of the container is on the east coast, the west coast and then rail or truck is the prefered method.
Just because something happens someway doesn't mean it is the most efficient way. Driving 55mph is far more efficient than 70mph (or the 80mph or 90mph that many people drive), and yet the speed limit on the interstate is usually 70mph. Maybe there are outside influences such as labor agreements or port fees or tariffs? Maybe the ship is then used to pick up containers at NY and transport to Europe? Maybe LA and San Diego or too crowded? Or maybe keeping the containers on the ship is cheaper than paying the storage fee in port? Or maybe since shipments are pooled, there might be a regulatory requirement that something be offloaded in NY so everybody else is basically along for the ride.
Who knows why anybody would want the goods to be in transit longer on the ship so they could be shipped back by rail or truck inland, but they must have their reason. Just like we all have our reason for driving faster than the most fuel efficient point for our cars.
I think the cargo ship math is off. It states the ship transports 11,000 20 foot containers. Well an 80 foot well car for containers will hold three of those and they are double stacked, so that means six per 80 foot car. That would require 1,833 cars for an approximate total length around 26 miles. Most stack trains are between 1.25 and 2 miles long in the US, meaning a cargo ship would require 13 to 20 trains to move all of the cargo (versus 5,500 trucks). That is assuming, of course, that those containers are all ready to ship once unloaded, but as a glance at any port will tell you, they tend to sit for months in storage until their destination is ready for delivery, so the actual burden on rail or truck is significantly less.
There is no doubt, however, that a cargo ship can move containers efficiently on water, but unless one lives on the coast in a port city, at some point, that container will need to be shipped by land. So the question still is there as to whether it is cheaper to off-load, say in LA and ship to Topeka or even NY or is it cheaper to go through the canal and up to Mobile or NY and offload and then get to your final destination. Since the off-loading should be comparable regardless of the port, transit time comes into play along with other economic decisions. And in those, the extra shipping costs do not necessarily win out staying longer on the boat than on the train or truck.
The US rail infrastructure could not remotely handle the amount of cargo that has to move. We are dependent on big trucks for cross country shipping because of it. Getting a country like nicaragua to approve the canal is orders of magnitude easier than convincing every local govt in the US to let you run new rails through it (on the east coast lots of rail lines are being torn up for bike paths)
Then we are in a world of hurt, because there are not enough highways and more importantly drivers for big trucks. To expand rail capacity does not require local govt approval. The railroads already own the right of away. Convincing them to spend billions of dollars without a taxpayer subsidy like trucking and shipping gets (who builds those highways and ports?), now that is a different story. Where local govt comes in is when cities expand to where the railroad is and they want the railroad to move. But that is a little bit like people who build housing near an airport and complain about the noise.
Studies have shown that the most efficient land based cargo transport is rail for long distance with truck for the last 250 miles. That would mean the train stops only every 500 miles or so. If you notice what the railroads have been doing post-regulation, that is exactly what they have been working towards for the past 40 years. Modern railroading is not what our parents and grand parents grew up with.
You have to take into the extra distance involved, the crew costs (including food, etc.), the fuel consumed waiting at the canal for your turn and a host of other things. For instance, nobody will argue that it is more efficient to ship from LA to NY via ship instead of rail. So yes, theoretically, a cargo ship is more efficient than a train assuming you are only using hypothetical efficiencies and not real world scenarios.
The story is short on details, the Spanish language op ed referred to in TFA indicates the canal would run through Lake Nicaragua. This route has been considered since before the US-dug canal through Panama. I could potentially be a sea-level canal, which would be a major plus, but which would radically alter the Lake. Either way, it'd be a big deal for shipping and save thousands of miles and tons of fuel for ships bigger than whatever they're calling the latest "Panamax." It seems to me the ports of New Orleans and Mobile in the US would benefit, perhaps also Atlantic ports in Europe.
Shipping from Asia, to the Southeast US doesn't make a lot of economical sense when you can transfer cargo containers on the West Coast of the US or even Mexico and transfer them by rail. Assuming the transfer operation takes the same time regardless of the port, the rail travel is comparable to sea and more fuel efficient. In addition, since regardless of the port in question (West or East coast), the port is not the final destination and often the goods are transferred by rail or truck a substantial distance. Getting the container off the ship onto rail at the earliest point, allows for the transfer to truck at the most efficient point, too. (ie. why go through the canal to Mobile, to ship the goods back to Topeka?).
One would think that a new canal has more to do with geo-politics than with economics.
Maybe they should first define terrorism before polling people about tracking phone use to prevent it. Terrorism used to be things like blowing up subways or flying planes into buildings for a political purpose. Now it has been expanded to all sorts of domestic violence (meaning on our homeland, not in our homes), to get around things like existing laws on surveillance, wiretapping, etc. Just like the RICO laws have been abused by using them against other groups than organized crime, so have the terrorism laws.
Another issue is how are the questions phrased? If asked if tracking people's phone use to prevent another 9/11 is okay, you will probably get a different response than asked if it is okay for the government to monitor your phone conversations to make sure you are not a terrorist. The first is in regards to generic people out there. The second is about you, yourself and implies if you don't have anything to hide, you don't have anything to worry about. But that isn't a sign of a free people, but instead a controlled people.
It was James Madison who said "I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations."
What we know with certainty is that life in the universe is rare, as far as we know earth is the only planet that has it.
That's total nonsense. And you contradict yourself in the next sentence:
Everything else about life elsewhere is simply hypothesis and statistics, but unproven.
We know nothing about life in the universe. Nothing. Zero, nada, zilch, null. Until we have a much larger data sample, it is all just theoretical. Completely true, and until the intervention of interstellar travel, unavoidable.
That is exactly why we're looking for any clues we might find. That includes not only Mars, but also Europa, for example, where some scientists believe we might find primitive life.
We know for sure that there's life on Earth. We can exclude most of the other planets and moons as they can not possibly sustain any life based on anything we can imagine.
But that's just the solar system. For the rest of the universe, we have, for example, just recently changed our estimate about how common planets are. We thought that most suns wouldn't have any, now we think almost the opposite.
We have just started having methods to find planets of earth size.
But still, life somewhere else in the solar system would be a pretty big deal.
Intelligent life is even rarer, given the biomass of earth.
Wrong. Biomass is not the deciding factor. Right now, our sample size indicates that 100% of planets with life at all will bring about intelligent life. But that could just be due to the anthropic principle. We don't know if Earth is a rare exception, or if there's something to evolution that will result in intelligence in most cases.
Again, getting closer to an answer here, in either direction, would be a pretty big deal.
I think we are arguing the same thing. In addition, I do agree that if it turns out that earth is not the only planet that harbors life, that would be a really big thing. My point being that all the statistics in the universe only speak to the probability that their might be life elsewhere, but those probabilities are based on really simplistic models such as a planet being in the right zone for water (when water is just one necessary ingredient).
As for the intelligent life versus biomass. You are only looking at the present day. The earth has a 2billion year history of life and intelligent life has only been around for the smallest fraction of a percent of that. If you look at the entirety of what we know about life on the planet earth, intelligent life is only a recent phenomenon and of all of the billions of species, if not trillions, that have ever existed, to our knowledge, only one is intelligent. That would still seem to qualify as rare from a scientific perspective. In reality, with only a sample size of one to go with, hypothesizing about life on a planet is a lot like Schrodinger's cat. We won't know until we look. And if we do find life, then as to whether or not there is intelligent life is another box that we will have to open and look in to find the answer.
There is a bold stance 'it is accepted in the scientific community that climate change is occurring'. So glad you could clear that up for all us Neanderthals.
That explains the 97% consensus. The remaining 3% must not get out much.
I'm not sure your point, but it is widely accepted that climate change is occurring and has been for the better part of 60 years. Where the debate has been centered is on the cause of the change.
Your IT person is incompetent because he has been accepting input from his staff and acting upon it? OMG, you better put a stop to that!
Without even knowing the situation in your company, here is where I would start. Take the two or three most recently failed or late projects. Look at the project goals and requirements and look at the budget that was allocated/approved. Was the project really doable at that level of funding? If yes, then, look for specific reasons why it failed, and not just technical reasons. There could be supply chain problems. There could be interference from other departments. There could be design changes along the way, etc. If the answer was no, the funding was not adequate, then look into how the funding amount came into existence. Was this the amount the manager asked for, or was this what was given to the project and it had to be made to work?
Very often, it is easy to blame the IT manager or department, when the obstacles to have a successful project are outside their control. However, from the title of the summary, it sounds like the decision has already been made that the person in question is incompetent and you are just looking for a way to prove it. Usually, incompetence doesn't need to be proven, it is self-evident. So then, maybe he/she really isn't incompetent and the problem lies elsewhere.
British Foreign Secretary on Surveillance Worries: '"Law Abiding Citizens Have Nothing to Worry About." Didn't a certain German Chancellor tell his people the same thing?
But, maybe the naysayers are right and it isn't climate change. I and many others would like to hear their hypothesis as to what is causing the changing weather patterns, melting polar caps and rising seas.
I agree with you, but if you haven't heard their hypothesis, it's because you haven't been paying attention. (congratulations.) Their current hypothesis is still that this is some kind of solar forcing that we haven't adequately accounted for.
They, whomever they may be don't have a hypothesis. Having a hypothesis would be paramount to stating that climate change is occuring and here is why. Instead they, whomever they may be, are saying that the current models are wrong, there is no climate change, because they haven't adequately accounted for solar forcing. Basically, it is accepted in the scientific community that climate change is occuring, so the "they" is in the minority (except on Fox News). As such, if they are taking the position that current models are wrong, then they, whomever they may be, should provide the empirical data to support that conclusion. Otherwise, they are only voicing an opinion and one not based on science, but rhetoric.
Exactly. Life in the solar system would change our view of life in the universe.
Right now, the only instance of a planet developing life is Earth. We extrapolate from there. But the big question (intelligent life) also hangs on the probability of life evolving into intelligent life.
If we find that life is actually a pretty common event in the universe, but it rarely evolves beyond bacterial or small organisms, it might change our equations on how likely we'll find some other space-faring race.
But if we find that life is rare, it'll also change it.
The combination of these two makes a pretty damn big differences on all "are we alone?" questions.
Your logic is backwards. What we know with certainty is that life in the universe is rare, as far as we know earth is the only planet that has it. Intelligent life is even rarer, given the biomass of earth. Everything else about life elsewhere is simply hypothesis and statistics, but unproven.
Therefore, your statement should work from the what if we find life instead of what if we don't find life. As for now, the answer is "Yes, as far as we know we are all alone."
Finding evidence of past water is an indication that it might have had life. I don't know what would be more interesting, to find that Mars once had life, or that it was habitable for a billion years and never developed life.
But anyway, that's what.
Finding evidence of past water is only an indication that there used to be water. Finding evidence of past water along with copious amounts of carbon, phosphourous, oxygen and a bunch of other minimal requirements would indicate that there might have been life, but just like the abscense of water would make the likelihood of life extremely poor, the abscences of thirty or forty other requirements would do the same thing. First you need the basic building blocks. Then you need them in the right quantities. And finally, you need whatever catalyst or energy source triggered the whole process. All of that has to come together at the right time and place or it doesn't work.
On one level, you are correct, we do not know how the CO2 level in the various ice core being sampled correlates to what the average temperature on of the planet was at that time. On the otherhand, we do know that the more CO2 and other greenhouse gases, the warmer the average temperature will be until it becomes a runaway system like Venus. We also know the approximate age of those ice core samples and we know from the fossil record elsewhere on the planet what the flora was and we can come pretty close to estimating what things were like.
Here is a simple car analogy for you. When you put your foot on the accelerator you expect it to go. When you put your foot on the brake, you expect it to stop. How do you know that will happen, since we do not have thousands of years of data to compare those actions with? The simple answer is you don't need thousands of years of data. You need reliable data points that are consistent enough that you can extrapolate the likelihood of something happening.
You don't know for certain that your car will go forward if you put your foot on the accelerator, but you expect it will, because the probability is high. Scientists don't know for certain what is going to happen with the climate if we continue as we have been, but they have very strong expectations because, based on the data, the probability is high.
Here's another way to think about it. How do we find sub-atomic particles? Somebody proposes how such and such particle should behave and then we go to the collider and look for something that behaves like it was predicted. If we find it, we confirm it. That's an example of the scientific method. Likewise, climate change makes certain predictions about the increased frequences of certain types of weather patterns and their severity. However, when these predictions are manifested in reality, certain powers that be deny it. So, why is this methodology acceptable in all other areas of science but not this one?
But, maybe the naysayers are right and it isn't climate change. I and many others would like to hear their hypothesis as to what is causing the changing weather patterns, melting polar caps and rising seas. If it is just a cyclical phenomenom as many opponents say, well, I am sure they have the data over the last 100,000 years to back that statement up. Otherwise, that is more wishful thinking than scientific methodology.
It sounds like the rest of the world is going to benefit the most. Russia is already well ahead in space tourism but it did look for a while like the US was about to catch up and overtake it. It will be interesting to see what happens to Virgin Galactic, since they are EU/UK based.
As long as Russia or Virgin Galactic or anybody else aren't using patents or technology that is now considered classified for national security reasons by the DOD and they have to find new ways to accomplish it. Look how long it took Boeing to reengineer their battery problem. How long would it take to do that for a space craft and get it re-certified? If the US has fallen behind, the front runners only have to be delayed long enough to allow the US to catch back up.
I guess if your definition of easy is that you shift the work to everybody else versus doing it for yourself then yes, shopping at Publix is easier than living off the land. OTOH if you look beyond the individual and look at the effort involved to enable one to shop at Publix versus living off the land, then a whole lot more work is involved.
Childbirth is easy (I've done it three times). It is painful, it is labor intensive (no pun intended) but it is not rocket science. For the most part there isn't even any mental process necessary as one's body takes over. I've also run marathons and from my experience, after 26 miles, yes, childbirth is easier. But, just because something is easy, however does not mean it is enjoyable or pleasant. Tieing a string to one's tooth and to a door knob and slamming the door is an easy way to extract a tooth, it is neither pleasant or enjoyable.
The problem with terms like easy and hard is that they are subjective. Simpler and more complex, while still maintaining a modicum of subjectivity, are much more straight forward. By definition a simpler process is an easier process compared to a complex process, is it not? Therefore growing your own food or living off the land is a simpler process than shopping at Publix. It does not mean it is better, or desirable. Only that it is less complex and therefore easier.
From a philosophical discussion the less complex the task the easier the task. From that framework, childbirth is no more complicated a process than squat, push, push some more and pick up the baby. Not to minimize what we woman go through, but those are the basic steps. A C-section is much more complex. fpr instance, but in many cases is also more desirable.
Back to the original statement that started this discussion was the notion that just because something was natural did not make it easy. And yet, natural is the most basic and therefore simplist path their is. Take food production, whether you grow your own or you purchase it at the store, the first step in the process is that it has to be grown. Then it has to be harvested and then stored. Both growing your own or purchasing it has these three basic steps. If you do grow your own, you are done until you wash it and cook it. However, there are many more steps involved to get it from the farmer to the shelf at Publix and then finally to your home. So, by definition, the many more steps, mean the process is more complex. Ergo, natural is simpler. The same methodology can be applied to living off the land or any number of processes. In each one, natural, or the closer one is to natural will yield the simpler result and simpler, being less complex is easier.
All of that said, it does not mean that simpler or easier is more desirable. There are many, many, reasons why just the opposite would be true and often the more complex process may ultimately be the more efficient use of resources or money. But even if it is more desirable, that doesn't make it simpler or easier.
That one person or very few people in our government are exerting almost complete totalitarian control over what goes up and comes down from space.
This is patently UN American. It is the antithesis to the spirit of freedom and exploration.
Can we please take this power away from these few individuals and at least tie it up in bureaucratic red tape so we can build an industry to lobby for its control later on before we miss this golden opportunity...
Oh well. Screw it. It never was about science, tech, or enlightenment (despite the all seeing eye being on everything), always politics, greed, and fear.
You should stop and think who benefits and who gets hurt by this new restriction. One only has to look at which DOD contractors are also involved with space flight to answer that question.
Slashdot Mirror
While I am not in favor of harming animals for the sake of harming them. This statute if it goes into effect is a two sided coin. Many of the treatments that we have for human beings were first perfected on animals. Those same treatments also benefit animals. Right now, people, right or wrong, spend millions of dollars on various treatments for their pets that are basically the results of animal testing on the way to perfecting treatments for humans. If you take away that research avenue, then where will the future animal research money come from?
So yes, we will protect the chimps and what ever other animals get included, but when your cat has feline lukemia or your dog needs some type of surgery to repair something, without the research first going from animal to human, it is unlikely that those skills and techniques are going to flow backwards.
Just a thought.
" nobody will argue that it is more efficient to ship from LA to NY via ship instead of rail. "
I'm not in a position to do the math, but I wouldn't be surprised if it is more efficient in some circumstances. A ship can move 10,000 containers. I'm guessing that is the equivilent 100+ trains.
A fully loaded cargo ship is 11,000 20ft containers. That is the equivalent of 18 to 24 trains. By the time the cargo ship gets through the Panama Canal, those trains will be unloaded onto trucks and going to their final destination.
It's important to remember that efficiency isn't measured just in miles per gallon. You have to take into account the extra distance to sale south from LA go through the canal then sale all the way back up to NY versus a more direct (although not straight) shot cross country. If the cross country route is 1/3 the distance travelled, it can burn three times the fuel per mile and still have the same fuel cost.
If you've got a container of stuff from China that needs distributing all over the US, then sure it makes sense to get it from LA. But if its purely for the east coast, then its not so clear.
If it is purely east coast, it could also go through the Suez Canal. It would be a shorter, more direct route that way depending on political tensions in the area.
imagine what one can do when one isn't paralyzed and yet can also work with these inputs...
Like watch their muscles atrophy because now they won't even have to pick up the remote to change channels or play video games?
Waving isn't truly simple. Look how long it takes an infant to "learn" how to to control the muscles to wave their arm. Just because we do it without thinking doesn't mean we should trivialize what a stroke victim may have to go through, even with brain implants.
That's a lot of maybe's. Do you have any numbers or cites to back your contention that say, China->LA, rail for LA->NY is more efficient than China->NY entirely by ship?
Only that LA unloads a lot more container ships than anywhere else in the US and the railroads transport those containers throughout the US. It would seem that businesses have already done the requisite analysis and found that unless the final destination of the container is on the east coast, the west coast and then rail or truck is the prefered method.
theoretically, a cargo ship is more efficient than a train assuming you are only using hypothetical efficiencies and not real world scenarios
Then why does so much Chinese freight get shipped directly to NY harbor? http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20120805/TRANSPORTATION/308059971
Just because something happens someway doesn't mean it is the most efficient way. Driving 55mph is far more efficient than 70mph (or the 80mph or 90mph that many people drive), and yet the speed limit on the interstate is usually 70mph. Maybe there are outside influences such as labor agreements or port fees or tariffs? Maybe the ship is then used to pick up containers at NY and transport to Europe? Maybe LA and San Diego or too crowded? Or maybe keeping the containers on the ship is cheaper than paying the storage fee in port? Or maybe since shipments are pooled, there might be a regulatory requirement that something be offloaded in NY so everybody else is basically along for the ride.
Who knows why anybody would want the goods to be in transit longer on the ship so they could be shipped back by rail or truck inland, but they must have their reason. Just like we all have our reason for driving faster than the most fuel efficient point for our cars.
the rail travel is comparable to sea and more fuel efficient.
Wrong. Container transport by ship is about 2.5 times as efficient as rail, according to these people in the shipping industry:
http://www.worldshipping.org/about-the-industry/liner-ships/container-ship-design
I think the cargo ship math is off. It states the ship transports 11,000 20 foot containers. Well an 80 foot well car for containers will hold three of those and they are double stacked, so that means six per 80 foot car. That would require 1,833 cars for an approximate total length around 26 miles. Most stack trains are between 1.25 and 2 miles long in the US, meaning a cargo ship would require 13 to 20 trains to move all of the cargo (versus 5,500 trucks). That is assuming, of course, that those containers are all ready to ship once unloaded, but as a glance at any port will tell you, they tend to sit for months in storage until their destination is ready for delivery, so the actual burden on rail or truck is significantly less.
There is no doubt, however, that a cargo ship can move containers efficiently on water, but unless one lives on the coast in a port city, at some point, that container will need to be shipped by land. So the question still is there as to whether it is cheaper to off-load, say in LA and ship to Topeka or even NY or is it cheaper to go through the canal and up to Mobile or NY and offload and then get to your final destination. Since the off-loading should be comparable regardless of the port, transit time comes into play along with other economic decisions. And in those, the extra shipping costs do not necessarily win out staying longer on the boat than on the train or truck.
The US rail infrastructure could not remotely handle the amount of cargo that has to move. We are dependent on big trucks for cross country shipping because of it. Getting a country like nicaragua to approve the canal is orders of magnitude easier than convincing every local govt in the US to let you run new rails through it (on the east coast lots of rail lines are being torn up for bike paths)
Then we are in a world of hurt, because there are not enough highways and more importantly drivers for big trucks. To expand rail capacity does not require local govt approval. The railroads already own the right of away. Convincing them to spend billions of dollars without a taxpayer subsidy like trucking and shipping gets (who builds those highways and ports?), now that is a different story. Where local govt comes in is when cities expand to where the railroad is and they want the railroad to move. But that is a little bit like people who build housing near an airport and complain about the noise.
Studies have shown that the most efficient land based cargo transport is rail for long distance with truck for the last 250 miles. That would mean the train stops only every 500 miles or so. If you notice what the railroads have been doing post-regulation, that is exactly what they have been working towards for the past 40 years. Modern railroading is not what our parents and grand parents grew up with.
the rail travel is comparable to sea and more fuel efficient.
Wrong. Container transport by ship is about 2.5 times as efficient as rail, according to these people in the shipping industry:
http://www.worldshipping.org/about-the-industry/liner-ships/container-ship-design
You have to take into the extra distance involved, the crew costs (including food, etc.), the fuel consumed waiting at the canal for your turn and a host of other things. For instance, nobody will argue that it is more efficient to ship from LA to NY via ship instead of rail. So yes, theoretically, a cargo ship is more efficient than a train assuming you are only using hypothetical efficiencies and not real world scenarios.
The climate has rarely been in stasis, fool
So true, but only a true fool would think the term climate change meant that.
The story is short on details, the Spanish language op ed referred to in TFA indicates the canal would run through Lake Nicaragua. This route has been considered since before the US-dug canal through Panama. I could potentially be a sea-level canal, which would be a major plus, but which would radically alter the Lake. Either way, it'd be a big deal for shipping and save thousands of miles and tons of fuel for ships bigger than whatever they're calling the latest "Panamax." It seems to me the ports of New Orleans and Mobile in the US would benefit, perhaps also Atlantic ports in Europe.
Shipping from Asia, to the Southeast US doesn't make a lot of economical sense when you can transfer cargo containers on the West Coast of the US or even Mexico and transfer them by rail. Assuming the transfer operation takes the same time regardless of the port, the rail travel is comparable to sea and more fuel efficient. In addition, since regardless of the port in question (West or East coast), the port is not the final destination and often the goods are transferred by rail or truck a substantial distance. Getting the container off the ship onto rail at the earliest point, allows for the transfer to truck at the most efficient point, too. (ie. why go through the canal to Mobile, to ship the goods back to Topeka?).
One would think that a new canal has more to do with geo-politics than with economics.
Maybe they should first define terrorism before polling people about tracking phone use to prevent it. Terrorism used to be things like blowing up subways or flying planes into buildings for a political purpose. Now it has been expanded to all sorts of domestic violence (meaning on our homeland, not in our homes), to get around things like existing laws on surveillance, wiretapping, etc. Just like the RICO laws have been abused by using them against other groups than organized crime, so have the terrorism laws.
Another issue is how are the questions phrased? If asked if tracking people's phone use to prevent another 9/11 is okay, you will probably get a different response than asked if it is okay for the government to monitor your phone conversations to make sure you are not a terrorist. The first is in regards to generic people out there. The second is about you, yourself and implies if you don't have anything to hide, you don't have anything to worry about. But that isn't a sign of a free people, but instead a controlled people.
It was James Madison who said "I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations."
What we know with certainty is that life in the universe is rare, as far as we know earth is the only planet that has it.
That's total nonsense. And you contradict yourself in the next sentence:
Everything else about life elsewhere is simply hypothesis and statistics, but unproven.
We know nothing about life in the universe. Nothing. Zero, nada, zilch, null. Until we have a much larger data sample, it is all just theoretical. Completely true, and until the intervention of interstellar travel, unavoidable.
That is exactly why we're looking for any clues we might find. That includes not only Mars, but also Europa, for example, where some scientists believe we might find primitive life.
We know for sure that there's life on Earth. We can exclude most of the other planets and moons as they can not possibly sustain any life based on anything we can imagine.
But that's just the solar system. For the rest of the universe, we have, for example, just recently changed our estimate about how common planets are. We thought that most suns wouldn't have any, now we think almost the opposite.
We have just started having methods to find planets of earth size.
But still, life somewhere else in the solar system would be a pretty big deal.
Intelligent life is even rarer, given the biomass of earth.
Wrong. Biomass is not the deciding factor. Right now, our sample size indicates that 100% of planets with life at all will bring about intelligent life. But that could just be due to the anthropic principle. We don't know if Earth is a rare exception, or if there's something to evolution that will result in intelligence in most cases.
Again, getting closer to an answer here, in either direction, would be a pretty big deal.
I think we are arguing the same thing. In addition, I do agree that if it turns out that earth is not the only planet that harbors life, that would be a really big thing. My point being that all the statistics in the universe only speak to the probability that their might be life elsewhere, but those probabilities are based on really simplistic models such as a planet being in the right zone for water (when water is just one necessary ingredient).
As for the intelligent life versus biomass. You are only looking at the present day. The earth has a 2billion year history of life and intelligent life has only been around for the smallest fraction of a percent of that. If you look at the entirety of what we know about life on the planet earth, intelligent life is only a recent phenomenon and of all of the billions of species, if not trillions, that have ever existed, to our knowledge, only one is intelligent. That would still seem to qualify as rare from a scientific perspective. In reality, with only a sample size of one to go with, hypothesizing about life on a planet is a lot like Schrodinger's cat. We won't know until we look. And if we do find life, then as to whether or not there is intelligent life is another box that we will have to open and look in to find the answer.
There is a bold stance 'it is accepted in the scientific community that climate change is occurring'. So glad you could clear that up for all us Neanderthals.
That explains the 97% consensus. The remaining 3% must not get out much.
I'm not sure your point, but it is widely accepted that climate change is occurring and has been for the better part of 60 years. Where the debate has been centered is on the cause of the change.
Your IT person is incompetent because he has been accepting input from his staff and acting upon it? OMG, you better put a stop to that!
Without even knowing the situation in your company, here is where I would start. Take the two or three most recently failed or late projects. Look at the project goals and requirements and look at the budget that was allocated/approved. Was the project really doable at that level of funding? If yes, then, look for specific reasons why it failed, and not just technical reasons. There could be supply chain problems. There could be interference from other departments. There could be design changes along the way, etc. If the answer was no, the funding was not adequate, then look into how the funding amount came into existence. Was this the amount the manager asked for, or was this what was given to the project and it had to be made to work?
Very often, it is easy to blame the IT manager or department, when the obstacles to have a successful project are outside their control. However, from the title of the summary, it sounds like the decision has already been made that the person in question is incompetent and you are just looking for a way to prove it. Usually, incompetence doesn't need to be proven, it is self-evident. So then, maybe he/she really isn't incompetent and the problem lies elsewhere.
British Foreign Secretary on Surveillance Worries: '"Law Abiding Citizens Have Nothing to Worry About"
The same could be said for governments, too. Maybe Britain would be willing to open up it's government records as a show of good faith?
British Foreign Secretary on Surveillance Worries: '"Law Abiding Citizens Have Nothing to Worry About." Didn't a certain German Chancellor tell his people the same thing?
But, maybe the naysayers are right and it isn't climate change. I and many others would like to hear their hypothesis as to what is causing the changing weather patterns, melting polar caps and rising seas.
I agree with you, but if you haven't heard their hypothesis, it's because you haven't been paying attention. (congratulations.) Their current hypothesis is still that this is some kind of solar forcing that we haven't adequately accounted for.
They, whomever they may be don't have a hypothesis. Having a hypothesis would be paramount to stating that climate change is occuring and here is why. Instead they, whomever they may be, are saying that the current models are wrong, there is no climate change, because they haven't adequately accounted for solar forcing. Basically, it is accepted in the scientific community that climate change is occuring, so the "they" is in the minority (except on Fox News). As such, if they are taking the position that current models are wrong, then they, whomever they may be, should provide the empirical data to support that conclusion. Otherwise, they are only voicing an opinion and one not based on science, but rhetoric.
Exactly. Life in the solar system would change our view of life in the universe.
Right now, the only instance of a planet developing life is Earth. We extrapolate from there. But the big question (intelligent life) also hangs on the probability of life evolving into intelligent life.
If we find that life is actually a pretty common event in the universe, but it rarely evolves beyond bacterial or small organisms, it might change our equations on how likely we'll find some other space-faring race.
But if we find that life is rare, it'll also change it.
The combination of these two makes a pretty damn big differences on all "are we alone?" questions.
Your logic is backwards. What we know with certainty is that life in the universe is rare, as far as we know earth is the only planet that has it. Intelligent life is even rarer, given the biomass of earth. Everything else about life elsewhere is simply hypothesis and statistics, but unproven.
Therefore, your statement should work from the what if we find life instead of what if we don't find life. As for now, the answer is "Yes, as far as we know we are all alone."
there may have been water on it. so what.
Finding evidence of past water is an indication that it might have had life. I don't know what would be more interesting, to find that Mars once had life, or that it was habitable for a billion years and never developed life.
But anyway, that's what.
Finding evidence of past water is only an indication that there used to be water. Finding evidence of past water along with copious amounts of carbon, phosphourous, oxygen and a bunch of other minimal requirements would indicate that there might have been life, but just like the abscense of water would make the likelihood of life extremely poor, the abscences of thirty or forty other requirements would do the same thing. First you need the basic building blocks. Then you need them in the right quantities. And finally, you need whatever catalyst or energy source triggered the whole process. All of that has to come together at the right time and place or it doesn't work.
On one level, you are correct, we do not know how the CO2 level in the various ice core being sampled correlates to what the average temperature on of the planet was at that time. On the otherhand, we do know that the more CO2 and other greenhouse gases, the warmer the average temperature will be until it becomes a runaway system like Venus. We also know the approximate age of those ice core samples and we know from the fossil record elsewhere on the planet what the flora was and we can come pretty close to estimating what things were like.
Here is a simple car analogy for you. When you put your foot on the accelerator you expect it to go. When you put your foot on the brake, you expect it to stop. How do you know that will happen, since we do not have thousands of years of data to compare those actions with? The simple answer is you don't need thousands of years of data. You need reliable data points that are consistent enough that you can extrapolate the likelihood of something happening.
You don't know for certain that your car will go forward if you put your foot on the accelerator, but you expect it will, because the probability is high. Scientists don't know for certain what is going to happen with the climate if we continue as we have been, but they have very strong expectations because, based on the data, the probability is high.
Here's another way to think about it. How do we find sub-atomic particles? Somebody proposes how such and such particle should behave and then we go to the collider and look for something that behaves like it was predicted. If we find it, we confirm it. That's an example of the scientific method. Likewise, climate change makes certain predictions about the increased frequences of certain types of weather patterns and their severity. However, when these predictions are manifested in reality, certain powers that be deny it. So, why is this methodology acceptable in all other areas of science but not this one?
But, maybe the naysayers are right and it isn't climate change. I and many others would like to hear their hypothesis as to what is causing the changing weather patterns, melting polar caps and rising seas. If it is just a cyclical phenomenom as many opponents say, well, I am sure they have the data over the last 100,000 years to back that statement up. Otherwise, that is more wishful thinking than scientific methodology.
It sounds like the rest of the world is going to benefit the most. Russia is already well ahead in space tourism but it did look for a while like the US was about to catch up and overtake it. It will be interesting to see what happens to Virgin Galactic, since they are EU/UK based.
As long as Russia or Virgin Galactic or anybody else aren't using patents or technology that is now considered classified for national security reasons by the DOD and they have to find new ways to accomplish it. Look how long it took Boeing to reengineer their battery problem. How long would it take to do that for a space craft and get it re-certified? If the US has fallen behind, the front runners only have to be delayed long enough to allow the US to catch back up.
I guess if your definition of easy is that you shift the work to everybody else versus doing it for yourself then yes, shopping at Publix is easier than living off the land. OTOH if you look beyond the individual and look at the effort involved to enable one to shop at Publix versus living off the land, then a whole lot more work is involved.
Childbirth is easy (I've done it three times). It is painful, it is labor intensive (no pun intended) but it is not rocket science. For the most part there isn't even any mental process necessary as one's body takes over. I've also run marathons and from my experience, after 26 miles, yes, childbirth is easier. But, just because something is easy, however does not mean it is enjoyable or pleasant. Tieing a string to one's tooth and to a door knob and slamming the door is an easy way to extract a tooth, it is neither pleasant or enjoyable.
The problem with terms like easy and hard is that they are subjective. Simpler and more complex, while still maintaining a modicum of subjectivity, are much more straight forward. By definition a simpler process is an easier process compared to a complex process, is it not? Therefore growing your own food or living off the land is a simpler process than shopping at Publix. It does not mean it is better, or desirable. Only that it is less complex and therefore easier.
From a philosophical discussion the less complex the task the easier the task. From that framework, childbirth is no more complicated a process than squat, push, push some more and pick up the baby. Not to minimize what we woman go through, but those are the basic steps. A C-section is much more complex. fpr instance, but in many cases is also more desirable.
Back to the original statement that started this discussion was the notion that just because something was natural did not make it easy. And yet, natural is the most basic and therefore simplist path their is. Take food production, whether you grow your own or you purchase it at the store, the first step in the process is that it has to be grown. Then it has to be harvested and then stored. Both growing your own or purchasing it has these three basic steps. If you do grow your own, you are done until you wash it and cook it. However, there are many more steps involved to get it from the farmer to the shelf at Publix and then finally to your home. So, by definition, the many more steps, mean the process is more complex. Ergo, natural is simpler. The same methodology can be applied to living off the land or any number of processes. In each one, natural, or the closer one is to natural will yield the simpler result and simpler, being less complex is easier.
All of that said, it does not mean that simpler or easier is more desirable. There are many, many, reasons why just the opposite would be true and often the more complex process may ultimately be the more efficient use of resources or money. But even if it is more desirable, that doesn't make it simpler or easier.
That one person or very few people in our government are exerting almost complete totalitarian control over what goes up and comes down from space.
This is patently UN American. It is the antithesis to the spirit of freedom and exploration.
Can we please take this power away from these few individuals and at least tie it up in bureaucratic red tape so we can build an industry to lobby for its control later on before we miss this golden opportunity...
Oh well. Screw it. It never was about science, tech, or enlightenment (despite the all seeing eye being on everything), always politics, greed, and fear.
You should stop and think who benefits and who gets hurt by this new restriction. One only has to look at which DOD contractors are also involved with space flight to answer that question.