"...the area around Moses Lake is mainly dust and exposed lava rock. Would think it'd make a pretty good proxy for the moon's surface."
Is that where they filmed all the fake moon landings?
In the future in the US, we may need to work harder to wrap our minds around such ideas. This is from the September 23 NY Times:
GOLDEN OPPORTUNITIES -- More Profit and Less Nursing at Many Homes By CHARLES DUHIGG Insulated from lawsuits by their corporate structures, private investors in nursing homes have cut expenses and staff, sometimes below minimum requirements.
Good point on the similarities to the MBTE situation. But there's a major difference also -- the alternatives to the PBDEs have a much longer history, so unforeseen consequences are much less likely.
Capitalist considerations (either positive or negative) aside, I have always thought it would be better to have another hour of light for very young children who have to wait for a parent to get home from work before they can go out trick-or-treating.
There's another reason to buy a Prius rather than a Civic hybrid -- the former has much better city mileage because their basic designs are quite different. The Honda is a small-engine ICE vehicle with an electric motor to provide assistance during rapid acceleration, while the Toyota is an electric vehicle with a small ICE to provide assistance at higher driving speeds.
A space program is irrelevant to your safety if you have a religion that does not care about the fate of humans or a religion that includes a got that will either: 1) protect us from events like errant asteroids in the short run or an expanding sun in the (very) long run; 2) soon decide it's time to shut down the project and take us all to our final reward or punishment. The rest of us know enough cosmology to understand that eventually we'll need to get out there and learn enough so that we can protect ourselves from asteroids and the like. Magical thinking (you can look it up) and/or waiting for Star Trek technology to save us is highly foolish.
Before I decided to fall back to my usual pattern and buy a good used car, I considered seriously both an Insight and a Prius. Test-drove both, and found them to be acceptable for most normal types of driving. But these cars are more disparate in design strategy than the press would have you understand. The differences can help you decide which type is best for you.
The Honda Civic and Insight are gasoline engine-powered cars with a supplementary electric motor to provide extra power when needed for acceleration and/or hill-climbing. Thus they get better mileage on flat open highways when they can run in overdrive on gasoline power only.
The Toyota Prius (both the current one and the new one being introduced) are electric cars with a supplementary gasoline engine to provide extra power at speeds over 15-20 mph and to charge the batteries when required. Thus they get better mileage at slow speed and in stop & go traffic where they can run mostly on battery power.
Other differences that result from the above design strategies:
1. At stop-lights, both shut down completely. But if you then start up by slowly pressing the accelerator (or the clutch on a manual) the Honda will start its gasoline engine and begin to move (with an automatic transmission) or run and wait for you to shift and pop the clutch. The Prius will begin to move forward on electric power only, and will not start the gasoline engine unless you push the accelerator down faster or reach a speed of about 15 mph.
2. Thus in stop & go traffic the Prius functions mostly as an electric automobile and can get very good mileage in these conditions. However, heating and air conditioning for the car need the higher power of the gasoline engine. So in the far north and far south of the US people should expect to get lower gas mileage than the car's specifications indicate. (I think this is one of the reasons Toyota has cycled through a redesign faster than Honda has.)
"...the area around Moses Lake is mainly dust and exposed lava rock. Would think it'd make a pretty good proxy for the moon's surface." Is that where they filmed all the fake moon landings?
In the future in the US, we may need to work harder to wrap our minds around such ideas. This is from the September 23 NY Times:
GOLDEN OPPORTUNITIES -- More Profit and Less Nursing at Many Homes
By CHARLES DUHIGG
Insulated from lawsuits by their corporate structures, private investors in nursing homes have cut expenses and staff, sometimes below minimum requirements.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/23/business/23nursing.html?th&emc=th
Good point on the similarities to the MBTE situation. But there's a major difference also -- the alternatives to the PBDEs have a much longer history, so unforeseen consequences are much less likely.
Capitalist considerations (either positive or negative) aside, I have always thought it would be better to have another hour of light for very young children who have to wait for a parent to get home from work before they can go out trick-or-treating.
There's another reason to buy a Prius rather than a Civic hybrid -- the former has much better city mileage because their basic designs are quite different. The Honda is a small-engine ICE vehicle with an electric motor to provide assistance during rapid acceleration, while the Toyota is an electric vehicle with a small ICE to provide assistance at higher driving speeds.
And that's good?
A space program is irrelevant to your safety if you have a religion that does not care about the fate of humans or a religion that includes a got that will either: 1) protect us from events like errant asteroids in the short run or an expanding sun in the (very) long run; 2) soon decide it's time to shut down the project and take us all to our final reward or punishment. The rest of us know enough cosmology to understand that eventually we'll need to get out there and learn enough so that we can protect ourselves from asteroids and the like. Magical thinking (you can look it up) and/or waiting for Star Trek technology to save us is highly foolish.
Before I decided to fall back to my usual pattern and buy a good used car, I considered seriously both an Insight and a Prius. Test-drove both, and found them to be acceptable for most normal types of driving. But these cars are more disparate in design strategy than the press would have you understand. The differences can help you decide which type is best for you. The Honda Civic and Insight are gasoline engine-powered cars with a supplementary electric motor to provide extra power when needed for acceleration and/or hill-climbing. Thus they get better mileage on flat open highways when they can run in overdrive on gasoline power only. The Toyota Prius (both the current one and the new one being introduced) are electric cars with a supplementary gasoline engine to provide extra power at speeds over 15-20 mph and to charge the batteries when required. Thus they get better mileage at slow speed and in stop & go traffic where they can run mostly on battery power. Other differences that result from the above design strategies: 1. At stop-lights, both shut down completely. But if you then start up by slowly pressing the accelerator (or the clutch on a manual) the Honda will start its gasoline engine and begin to move (with an automatic transmission) or run and wait for you to shift and pop the clutch. The Prius will begin to move forward on electric power only, and will not start the gasoline engine unless you push the accelerator down faster or reach a speed of about 15 mph. 2. Thus in stop & go traffic the Prius functions mostly as an electric automobile and can get very good mileage in these conditions. However, heating and air conditioning for the car need the higher power of the gasoline engine. So in the far north and far south of the US people should expect to get lower gas mileage than the car's specifications indicate. (I think this is one of the reasons Toyota has cycled through a redesign faster than Honda has.)