I'm open to correction here but I believe that the diesel sold in the US isn't as clean as the stuff sold in Europe. Has a higher sulphur content. Or something.
I used to sit in the third lane of English motorways at over 90mph in a Transit. That used to bug the hell out of people. No matter how fast you make one of them things go, people still feel the need to get past you.
In all that time I can think of 2 things that require massive payloads. 1) Manned spaceflight. 2) Space based weapon systems.
Okay, but you could also add:
Parts for space stations for space tourists
Parts for interplanetary vessels
Parts for lunar/asteroid mining equipment
As you say, interplanetary mining could be lucrative. You never know what they're gonna find up there. If some incredibly useful material is discovered on the moon and it becomes a key component of the world economy (like coal was before and oil is now) then it will become economical to go that far to get it a lot quicker if a cheap and easy route to orbit was opened up.
it would be far cheaper to wrap whatever it is in an ablative shield and drop it in an empty field somewhere.
Not a bad idea. A good heat shield, a strong set of parachutes, an unpopulated area, and send it down in small quantities in case of accidents.
Seriously we are talking about spending several billion dollars to POTENTIALLY save a few million. I say potentially, because the space industry is littered with the bleached bones of other projects that were supposedly going to save us a pile of cash.
Absolutely right. The shuttle was supposed to be cheaper by virtue of being 'reusable,' but it turned out that the damn thing would have to be re-built after every flight like a Formula 1 racing car has to be rebuilt after every Grand Prix.
Economic: A space elevator is a "cheap" way to get a ton of material into space, for which there is only a market for a few pounds.
No market exists for hauling tonnes of stuff into space (except for building the ISS) because it is so damn expensive and it's only economical to put a couple of pounds up there. Once it becomes economical to put bulk loads into orbit, the market for bulk loads will develop. 'Build it and they will come' and all that.
Who wrote the op-ed and in what way are they qualified to speak about intellectual property?
The Economist doesn't do by-lines. They give the reason for it on their website:
Why is it anonymous? Many hands write The Economist, but it speaks with a collective voice. Leaders are discussed, often disputed, each week in meetings that are open to all members of the editorial staff. Journalists often co-operate on articles. And some articles are heavily edited. The main reason for anonymity, however, is a belief that what is written is more important than who writes it. As Geoffrey Crowther, editor from 1938 to 1956, put it, anonymity keeps the editor "not the master but the servant of something far greater than himself. You can call that ancestor-worship if you wish, but it gives to the paper an astonishing momentum of thought and principle."
I see that they're giving a free day pass to their web content today.
If the People's Republic of North Korea or the Chinese or the likes of Iran were ever to start putting weapons systems into orbit, do you think that the treaties would still be ignored by Uncle Sam or would he be trying to enforce them?
So you'd rather go with the emissions from gas, coal, and oil plants, the ecological degradation of hydroelectric construction and coal mining, the political bickering from oil, the erosion issues from tidal plants, and the chemical morass from solar and battery production all to avoid something that is a rare occurence?
Nope. I'm a conservation man myself. I'm the sort of guy who fixes a leaky roof rather than just putting a bigger drip under it. America's disproportionately large consumtion of the world's resources is a complex matter. I've discussed it at some length in my journal. You're welcome to join in.
As for other energy sources, well:
Coal is history. Expensive to get at, transport, and it emits CO2.
Gas is easier and cheaper to handle, but you still have the CO2 problem.
Hydroelectricity doesn't have the CO2 problem, but it does have the environmental problems you mention.
Didn't hear anything about erosion from tidal plants, but it sounds interesting and I'll look into it.
Wind power is something you don't mention, but it also has environmental issues unless you put the things offshore, which is expensive but then so are oil rigs. It's a technology that I keep an eye on.
Nuclear - where do I begin? Yes the technology can be made safer, but the fact remains that the consequences of something going wrong, no matter how unlikely, are far too great. I would not want the American midwest to end up like the Ukraine. That place is full of enough genetically defective people as it is. But here's something none of you have addressed: What happens when we're all gone? That stuff goes on radiating for thousands of years - longer than civilisation has been around and a damn-sight longer than the USA has been around. Think we're so clever that we can design an indestructable containment method that no future generation will accidentally break through? Please!
Well it is common knowledge that all evil comes from British accents and all that is good is voiced through American (or Canadian, afterall hayden is Canadian) accents.
The stormtroopers all had American accents. So did Boba Fett in the original versions of the movies, and it was a lot nicer on the ear than the croaking rasp of the guy who played Jango Fett, or whoever did Boba's voice in the Empire Strikes Back redux.
The point I'm trying to make is that fuck-ups happen. No matter how many safeguards you put in place, the risk is just too great when you are dealing with nuclear material. Period.
He didn't change accents... that was the fine British engineered voice box he used as part of the Vader helmet.
No way Jose. When Luke pulled his dad's helmet off at the end of Return of the Jedi, Vader/Anakin spoke with an English accent. "You were right about me," he said. Remember?
So I ask again. Would you feel quite safe having a nuclear power plant right in the middle of town? If they're so clean and safe, how come you can't get insurance to build one, and how come they're always built away out in the wilds?
By any standard you can think of -- coverage, price, ubiquity -- China's cellphone practices beat ours.
Okay, it's a Canadian article, but already I can hear the gasps of amazement from US-based./ers that they don't have the best cellphone service in the world. But anybody from just about any other industrialised country that moves to the US always ends up disappointed with the service. I was used to being able to use SMS with all my friends - not anymore. Hell, my service is so unreliable there's a 50% chance of any of my texts getting through. And about 50% of my calls get dropped - something that never happened in the UK unless I was going into a tunnel.
During a red light, you know whether you have time to check that map; on a green light, you know whether to start braking a block away -- or to stomp on the accelerator, as though you were a Toronto or Montreal driver. (That's probably why Montreal has a few lights with countdown seconds for pedestrians.)
Countdown timers for pedestrians are all over San Francisco, but countdown timers for drivers is a great idea.
Wouldn't it be great to have a single debit card for buses, subways -- and taxis?
Sounds a bit like a sophisticated version of the travel passes you can buy in London that work on all the buses, trains and in the tube.
In China, roadside electronic billboards not only give directions to nearby lots and garages, they crucially reveal how many empty spaces are left.
Some English cities have these. I saw them in Manchester years ago.
Look at Japan, new high tech everything.
It's easy when you start from nothing.
Same reason the German and French trains run on time but the British ones don't. Britain's railway infrastructure survived WWII, industrial revolution-era bottlenecks and all. The French and Germans were able to build from scratch. I'll bet that Chinese Maglev train doesn't have to share its tracks with local commuter trains, freight services and squeeze onto two-track sections to get over any victorian viaducts.
New nuclear power plants are failsafe (see the referenced slashdot discussion) and have zero chance of radiation leakage, unless you set off a nuclear weapon next to one.
So are we going to build one in downtown Washington DC then?
...[the greens] seem to think that if we all used half as much energy we wouldn't have to generate the rest.
Energy conservation is about making more efficient use of the same amount of energy. If you use an energy efficient lightbulb that uses half the power of an incandescent one, you actually don't have to generate the other half.
[Nuclear power] kills fewer people, releases no pollution, and is actually cheaper once you start factoring in medical costs.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm open to correction here but I believe that the diesel sold in the US isn't as clean as the stuff sold in Europe. Has a higher sulphur content. Or something.
I used to sit in the third lane of English motorways at over 90mph in a Transit. That used to bug the hell out of people. No matter how fast you make one of them things go, people still feel the need to get past you.
- Parts for space stations for space tourists
- Parts for interplanetary vessels
- Parts for lunar/asteroid mining equipment
As you say, interplanetary mining could be lucrative. You never know what they're gonna find up there. If some incredibly useful material is discovered on the moon and it becomes a key component of the world economy (like coal was before and oil is now) then it will become economical to go that far to get it a lot quicker if a cheap and easy route to orbit was opened up. Not a bad idea. A good heat shield, a strong set of parachutes, an unpopulated area, and send it down in small quantities in case of accidents. Absolutely right. The shuttle was supposed to be cheaper by virtue of being 'reusable,' but it turned out that the damn thing would have to be re-built after every flight like a Formula 1 racing car has to be rebuilt after every Grand Prix.Just watch BBC!
I loved my big Meccano kit.
Is this really so complicated that someone had to write a book about it?
My point is that if the USA wants other countries to recognise the rule of international law, it had better start respecting international law itself.
If the People's Republic of North Korea or the Chinese or the likes of Iran were ever to start putting weapons systems into orbit, do you think that the treaties would still be ignored by Uncle Sam or would he be trying to enforce them?
As for other energy sources, well:
Coal is history. Expensive to get at, transport, and it emits CO2.
Gas is easier and cheaper to handle, but you still have the CO2 problem.
Hydroelectricity doesn't have the CO2 problem, but it does have the environmental problems you mention.
Didn't hear anything about erosion from tidal plants, but it sounds interesting and I'll look into it.
Wind power is something you don't mention, but it also has environmental issues unless you put the things offshore, which is expensive but then so are oil rigs. It's a technology that I keep an eye on.
Nuclear - where do I begin? Yes the technology can be made safer, but the fact remains that the consequences of something going wrong, no matter how unlikely, are far too great. I would not want the American midwest to end up like the Ukraine. That place is full of enough genetically defective people as it is. But here's something none of you have addressed: What happens when we're all gone? That stuff goes on radiating for thousands of years - longer than civilisation has been around and a damn-sight longer than the USA has been around. Think we're so clever that we can design an indestructable containment method that no future generation will accidentally break through? Please!
The point I'm trying to make is that fuck-ups happen. No matter how many safeguards you put in place, the risk is just too great when you are dealing with nuclear material. Period.
What I'm dying to know is how Anakin's fall from grace caused him to dump the American accent and adopt the Imperial English accent.
So I ask again. Would you feel quite safe having a nuclear power plant right in the middle of town? If they're so clean and safe, how come you can't get insurance to build one, and how come they're always built away out in the wilds?