And if insurance companies could get the expectations exactly right, then no one would buy insurance. Whatever price they offered it at, just save that money and pay the bills when they arrive. You'd be certain to be ahead. If it was too expensive, public transportation would probably be cheaper.
Well it's almost too insightful. Insightful would be to recognize that large organizations do not further their own interests, but people at high levels determine what those supposed interests are. And typically those people further the supposed large organizations' interests only when they further their own personal interests. Defense lawyers at least are very clearly trying to further their own interests. Their strategy may very well work but their profile has definitely increased. If their strategy fails, they may be known as a miserable failure, but at least they'll be known and that may work out better than being unknown.
We were paying a contractor 50K/year to maintain a database. It was a complete mess. I rewrote it with my meager skills to be about 5 times as fast and much more user friendly, as the guys who used it sat next to me. If I made a mistake, it was fixed within a day, rather than the glacial progress the contractor made. Not to say we saved money, it just meant that that money went to what the contractor was truly there for--engineering support, which they were better than us at, compared to database management, which they were not. Since that time, our contracting dollars have decreased at least 50% and the contractor locally went from 6 people to 1 and a part-timer. There are still quite a few under the contract at the main office though.
The previous GS-15 did as much as possible to keep the contractor funded. My actions were ok because he wanted them for engineering support which provided better results than basic database management. Also no change in final money. New management doesn't care if the contractor gets a dime. There's still going to be some money for them, but current realities say there's not going to be much....That's been going on for about three years anyways. Also means that the government civilians need to do more of the job ourselves. Better justifies our jobs anyways. This being Air Force and NSPS, being good technically at your job is not going to get you a pay raise though. Still having a job is better than many can say though.
A coworker started his Navy career in the CB (Construction Battalion) Much of the 'ordering parts' for his job was done under cover of darkness.
Likewise, Air Force instructions related to computers, if followed, are assured to prevent any work being accomplished (especially since the computer use Microsoft products). This is all done in the name of 'security'.
Well considering what makes the news these days, I think you could argue that such information is in the public interest. My local news, while 'reporting' on missing children cases, spends waaayyy too much time on the participants that go well into just gossip. Additionally, one of the primary purposes of gossip type talk is to make us feel better about our lives by sharing how screwed up other people's lives are. So sharing news about a bastard is for the public good.
If you could match speeds with it, you could go where it goes without need for the asteroid. Since the asteroid has no propulsion of its own, it's not providing any benefits, if you 'match' speeds (actually velocity, speed and direction). The benefit only comes in matching position and letting the asteroid change the velocity of the spacecraft to match. As long as the spacecraft survives that impact, then it can be used to provide a great momentum transfer.
My job is risk. But it is safety risk. Our VaR is expected casualties, which are very low (much less than 1) and we have a history of 0 casualties in the public. But at the same time, our management strategy is risk management + risk mitigation/avoidance, with the focus on avoidance. Our biggest concern is not our risk value (generally low, as mentioned) but our catastrophic risk or Taleb's black swan.
Because of our mitigation efforts, our concern is only the at best 1 in 1000 event that might cause a casualty (or 20). Our efforts are always directed at making that risk smaller or accepting that the costs of implementation are greater than the benefit provided by reducing an already small number. It's similar but also very different in that our benefit is always small but the consequence of failure is huge and our whole purpose for existence.
Just because we are more aware of the dangers of catastrophic risk does not mean we have developed an effective measure to encapsulate relative meaning of different risks. We hope one day to develop one we are satisfied with, but until then we recognize the risks rather than fully measure them.
Actually, neither DoD and NASA do any of the actual launching, though NASA comes closer. USA (United Space Alliance) does most of the prep work involved in the Shuttle and ULA (United Launch Alliance) launches most of the DoD rockets. Both are Boeing/Lockheed Martin joint efforts. DoD and NASA only get more involved once their payloads are in orbit (and beyond for NASA). Had Bush done this, it would have been because money was changing hands not because of militarization. Which may have been how ARES won.
And besides, Bush (though it easily could have just been the generals in this case) has proceeded towards militarization of space. Unfortunately for them, the ideas are easier said than done. And many of those ideas have flowed from Reagan's era and before. Almost all militarization of space ideas are just really bad ideas, and/or too expensive.
It's not classified. ULA (United Launch Alliance) already sells it to any customer willing to launch in the USA. Unfortunately, due to costs and red tape, that doesn't happen that often. The basic plan (which NASA would modify beyond recognition) would be to use existing ULA rockets to launch manned capsules and unmanned payloads for NASA. This is very similar to the ARES plan just with a different rocket (particularly a liquid rocket instead of solid). I don't necessarily assume that it would be cheaper/better/faster, especially now that NASA has sunk quite a bit into the current ARES plan. It did seem that the option was eliminated a bit too early though, as if engineering decisions were ignored because executives and/or congressmen/VPs had already made the decisions. Not saying it happened that way, but it was suspicious.
I competed in mathematics during high school (11th in US at age 15) I chose Aerospace Engineering. Through bad timing and other mistakes, I did a lot of different things that while at times interesting, weren't terribly fulfilling. Now I am a mathematician doing risk analysis for space launches. It's a mix between my two desires.
I originally chose not to get a degree in mathematics because I was unaware of the possibilities after college. If I had it to do over, I would have got the degree in mathematics. But that is also because I enjoy mathematics.
From my own experience, there's multiple possible career paths for most everyone. The key is setting yourself up to be flexible enough to enjoy any of those that become available. Also, do you want to be a specialist or a jack-of-all-trades? Plus what will be your desires 5/10/20 years from now. Few people really know. Which is why I recommend the flexibility.
You're absolutely right that it's an unbelievably complex problem. And just quoting a risk value of 1:45 doesn't quite tell the whole story either. Because when a satelite (or the Shuttle) breaks up on entry, there's not just one piece. I've visited KSC where they have much of the Columbia debris, and it's quite a lot.
The risk estimate is meant to be an average estimate, that will have quite a bit of uncertainty. And that's supposed to include ocean splashdowns as well. Truthfully, there's probably at least an order of magnitude uncertainty on either side of any such result.
The estimate I remembered (not quoted) for the Shuttle accident was from http://caib.nasa.gov/, (find the actual value in one of the many volumes) an after the event estimate. If the Shuttle had come down over Dallas, the casualty expectation was over 1. That doesn't mean that it was a guarantee that someone would have been injured. It means that the probability of 1 injury times 1 + the probability of 2 injuries times 2 + and so on was greater than one. And that took buildings into account.
Like I said, no one can guarantee that estimate is anywhere near exact. Plus there's so many possibilities that such numbers are just meant to be an average estimate
Typically a normal satellite will quote around 1000 sqft of 'casualty area' if it came back in. But who knows what it would actually be when it actually happens? And where the 'targets' are.
describe: to represent or give an account of in words.
Yep that's exactly what he did. If a word is not to be taken axiomatically then it has to be described using words or ideas that are taken to be axioms or can be built from words taken to be axioms.
A color is either a wavelength or range or mix of wavelengths of light or is defined by similarity to what a person perceives. If you want to describe a sight to a blind person who does not and can not have the experience of seeing, then the blind person has to provide the necessary axioms.
You have stated that the basic axioms are insufficient, therefore you have introduced a new axiom. One of the axioms is that both sender and receiver are using the same set of axioms. Therefore, given a set of axioms, i.e., words related to wavelengths not allowed and words related to sight not allowed, it may be impossible to describe color.
Here's a similar exercise: describe a sphere to 2-D individual, without using a third dimension. Don't like that, describe what the entirety of a hypersphere looks like. Or back to sighted questions: What do gamma rays look like? And if you say they are invisible, well that just means not visible. You might as well say you don't know because you can't see gamma rays.
Likewise, the color blue holds a mostly common experience, but think about people who are color-blind and may have an entirely different experience. The GP description of blue which was true for a normally sighted person, and your different description for a blind person, could be different still for a color-blind person. All would be valid under the right axioms and could be false under a different set.
This is so true. I left my workplace a year ago and (being government) it took 6 months before they could actually look for a replacement. Another 4 months after that before my replacement was brought online (it happened to be me). Many things that I did were left undone. A contractor also made some good money off the organization while I was away. On my way out I tried to make my knowledge available but no one had time to pay attention.
Because I couldn't sell my house, I eventually came back to the old job (essentially with a 20% pay increase) after about 10 months. The gaps were never truly covered and 'customers' were alienated. For a business, they have to be able to handle the loss and figure out how to replace you...if necessary. At least, that's what should happen if management is smart.
That pretty much is the plan. FCOs (RSO in NASA-speak) will let the Shuttle fly until it is no longer controllable, unless the public is endangered. If the Shuttle is headed for the nearby cities, then it becomes a matter of 7 people on the Shuttle or 70 or more people just enjoying their day and hoping to watch a good launch. At that point the decision becomes much easier.
It's also an issue if the Shuttle blows up and the SRB manage to fly without tumbling, such as in the Challenger accident. The SRB destruct were activated on that mission.
There are two guys on each launch. Plus there are several support guys who are also trained or in training Mission Flight Control Officers (MFCO). RSO is just the term NASA calls them. Besides manned missions, they work every unmanned mission at the Cape. While they do discuss whether or not to take out a launch before doing so, when necessary, it only takes one to activate the destruct system and both are capable. The same system and controls are in use for both manned and unmanned launches.
In Florida, the state estimates an average of roughly 1.65 deaths per 100 million miles driven. Different states will have different numbers and obviously with an average, it will include many riskier events (drunk driving, street racing, etc.) along with your typical sunday drive probably being below this value. You could then pop the values in and get an estimate for a lifetime risk, but the value changes every year (it's been generally going down with time) http://www.flhsmv.gov/reports/crash_facts.html
Except that when it came to satellite radio, there was a good chance that the options were not whether it was going to be 2 or 1, but whether you had 1 or 0 satellite radio providers. Now, prices are almost certainly headed upwards for satellite radio, but if they adjust them too far, even a merged company will drive itself into bankruptcy.
Truthfully, it's 3 or 4 times a week but that's just because my two kids take up too much of our time and energy. My wife wanted it at least twice a day before kids, not that she necessarily got it that often. And I am much more of a geek than my wife is.
You forget, some people got married BEFORE they got a slashdot account. Those people will get laid once a month just like any other married guy with children.
While your argument is usually quite valid, these days the liquidity holds strongest. I tried selling my house and failed to find a buyer. The home is definitely value locked up pretty strongly, besides all the fees involved in selling/buying.
The time value of money does apply and in general to putting extra money towards a 30 year loan at 6%, the investment is the better choice. But inflation is something that should also be considered when comparing spending now or investing and spending later. Inflation may now be a serious consideration for all long term fiscal planning as the value of the money may be greater now than in future.
the tax writeoff is now always a guarantee. The interest on my home has not been large enough to claim since I owned it. The standard deduction exceeds what I can claim
Arcades that maximized their profit by elevating the playfield angle is part of the reason...3 balls instead of 5 was another. Touchy tilts. Poorly maintained and/or abused machines as well. I usually spent more of my arcade quarters on pinball than video games, but at some arcades it just wasn't worth it to play pinball. When it started to be all the arcades, I stopped playing them. The home machines were taking off as well.
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And if insurance companies could get the expectations exactly right, then no one would buy insurance. Whatever price they offered it at, just save that money and pay the bills when they arrive. You'd be certain to be ahead. If it was too expensive, public transportation would probably be cheaper.
Well it's almost too insightful. Insightful would be to recognize that large organizations do not further their own interests, but people at high levels determine what those supposed interests are. And typically those people further the supposed large organizations' interests only when they further their own personal interests. Defense lawyers at least are very clearly trying to further their own interests. Their strategy may very well work but their profile has definitely increased. If their strategy fails, they may be known as a miserable failure, but at least they'll be known and that may work out better than being unknown.
That's a man who's been in once, but I don't think you're going to get him to do it a second time.
We were paying a contractor 50K/year to maintain a database. It was a complete mess. I rewrote it with my meager skills to be about 5 times as fast and much more user friendly, as the guys who used it sat next to me. If I made a mistake, it was fixed within a day, rather than the glacial progress the contractor made. Not to say we saved money, it just meant that that money went to what the contractor was truly there for--engineering support, which they were better than us at, compared to database management, which they were not. Since that time, our contracting dollars have decreased at least 50% and the contractor locally went from 6 people to 1 and a part-timer. There are still quite a few under the contract at the main office though.
The previous GS-15 did as much as possible to keep the contractor funded. My actions were ok because he wanted them for engineering support which provided better results than basic database management. Also no change in final money. New management doesn't care if the contractor gets a dime. There's still going to be some money for them, but current realities say there's not going to be much....That's been going on for about three years anyways. Also means that the government civilians need to do more of the job ourselves. Better justifies our jobs anyways. This being Air Force and NSPS, being good technically at your job is not going to get you a pay raise though. Still having a job is better than many can say though.
A coworker started his Navy career in the CB (Construction Battalion) Much of the 'ordering parts' for his job was done under cover of darkness. Likewise, Air Force instructions related to computers, if followed, are assured to prevent any work being accomplished (especially since the computer use Microsoft products). This is all done in the name of 'security'.
Well considering what makes the news these days, I think you could argue that such information is in the public interest. My local news, while 'reporting' on missing children cases, spends waaayyy too much time on the participants that go well into just gossip. Additionally, one of the primary purposes of gossip type talk is to make us feel better about our lives by sharing how screwed up other people's lives are. So sharing news about a bastard is for the public good.
If you could match speeds with it, you could go where it goes without need for the asteroid. Since the asteroid has no propulsion of its own, it's not providing any benefits, if you 'match' speeds (actually velocity, speed and direction). The benefit only comes in matching position and letting the asteroid change the velocity of the spacecraft to match. As long as the spacecraft survives that impact, then it can be used to provide a great momentum transfer.
My job is risk. But it is safety risk. Our VaR is expected casualties, which are very low (much less than 1) and we have a history of 0 casualties in the public. But at the same time, our management strategy is risk management + risk mitigation/avoidance, with the focus on avoidance. Our biggest concern is not our risk value (generally low, as mentioned) but our catastrophic risk or Taleb's black swan.
Because of our mitigation efforts, our concern is only the at best 1 in 1000 event that might cause a casualty (or 20). Our efforts are always directed at making that risk smaller or accepting that the costs of implementation are greater than the benefit provided by reducing an already small number. It's similar but also very different in that our benefit is always small but the consequence of failure is huge and our whole purpose for existence.
Just because we are more aware of the dangers of catastrophic risk does not mean we have developed an effective measure to encapsulate relative meaning of different risks. We hope one day to develop one we are satisfied with, but until then we recognize the risks rather than fully measure them.
Actually, neither DoD and NASA do any of the actual launching, though NASA comes closer. USA (United Space Alliance) does most of the prep work involved in the Shuttle and ULA (United Launch Alliance) launches most of the DoD rockets. Both are Boeing/Lockheed Martin joint efforts. DoD and NASA only get more involved once their payloads are in orbit (and beyond for NASA). Had Bush done this, it would have been because money was changing hands not because of militarization. Which may have been how ARES won.
And besides, Bush (though it easily could have just been the generals in this case) has proceeded towards militarization of space. Unfortunately for them, the ideas are easier said than done. And many of those ideas have flowed from Reagan's era and before. Almost all militarization of space ideas are just really bad ideas, and/or too expensive.
It's not classified. ULA (United Launch Alliance) already sells it to any customer willing to launch in the USA. Unfortunately, due to costs and red tape, that doesn't happen that often. The basic plan (which NASA would modify beyond recognition) would be to use existing ULA rockets to launch manned capsules and unmanned payloads for NASA. This is very similar to the ARES plan just with a different rocket (particularly a liquid rocket instead of solid). I don't necessarily assume that it would be cheaper/better/faster, especially now that NASA has sunk quite a bit into the current ARES plan. It did seem that the option was eliminated a bit too early though, as if engineering decisions were ignored because executives and/or congressmen/VPs had already made the decisions. Not saying it happened that way, but it was suspicious.
I competed in mathematics during high school (11th in US at age 15) I chose Aerospace Engineering. Through bad timing and other mistakes, I did a lot of different things that while at times interesting, weren't terribly fulfilling. Now I am a mathematician doing risk analysis for space launches. It's a mix between my two desires.
I originally chose not to get a degree in mathematics because I was unaware of the possibilities after college. If I had it to do over, I would have got the degree in mathematics. But that is also because I enjoy mathematics.
From my own experience, there's multiple possible career paths for most everyone. The key is setting yourself up to be flexible enough to enjoy any of those that become available. Also, do you want to be a specialist or a jack-of-all-trades? Plus what will be your desires 5/10/20 years from now. Few people really know. Which is why I recommend the flexibility.
I switch jobs about every two years. I too enjoy the ability to learn something new and/or get out of something boring.
You're absolutely right that it's an unbelievably complex problem. And just quoting a risk value of 1:45 doesn't quite tell the whole story either. Because when a satelite (or the Shuttle) breaks up on entry, there's not just one piece. I've visited KSC where they have much of the Columbia debris, and it's quite a lot.
The risk estimate is meant to be an average estimate, that will have quite a bit of uncertainty. And that's supposed to include ocean splashdowns as well. Truthfully, there's probably at least an order of magnitude uncertainty on either side of any such result.
The estimate I remembered (not quoted) for the Shuttle accident was from http://caib.nasa.gov/, (find the actual value in one of the many volumes) an after the event estimate. If the Shuttle had come down over Dallas, the casualty expectation was over 1. That doesn't mean that it was a guarantee that someone would have been injured. It means that the probability of 1 injury times 1 + the probability of 2 injuries times 2 + and so on was greater than one. And that took buildings into account.
Like I said, no one can guarantee that estimate is anywhere near exact. Plus there's so many possibilities that such numbers are just meant to be an average estimate
Typically a normal satellite will quote around 1000 sqft of 'casualty area' if it came back in. But who knows what it would actually be when it actually happens? And where the 'targets' are.
Not really. Columbia was calculated at roughly 1:3 casualty. It does seem a little high, but not more than about an order of magnitude.
from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/describe
Yep that's exactly what he did. If a word is not to be taken axiomatically then it has to be described using words or ideas that are taken to be axioms or can be built from words taken to be axioms.A color is either a wavelength or range or mix of wavelengths of light or is defined by similarity to what a person perceives. If you want to describe a sight to a blind person who does not and can not have the experience of seeing, then the blind person has to provide the necessary axioms.
You have stated that the basic axioms are insufficient, therefore you have introduced a new axiom. One of the axioms is that both sender and receiver are using the same set of axioms. Therefore, given a set of axioms, i.e., words related to wavelengths not allowed and words related to sight not allowed, it may be impossible to describe color.
Here's a similar exercise: describe a sphere to 2-D individual, without using a third dimension. Don't like that, describe what the entirety of a hypersphere looks like. Or back to sighted questions: What do gamma rays look like? And if you say they are invisible, well that just means not visible. You might as well say you don't know because you can't see gamma rays.
Likewise, the color blue holds a mostly common experience, but think about people who are color-blind and may have an entirely different experience. The GP description of blue which was true for a normally sighted person, and your different description for a blind person, could be different still for a color-blind person. All would be valid under the right axioms and could be false under a different set.
This is so true. I left my workplace a year ago and (being government) it took 6 months before they could actually look for a replacement. Another 4 months after that before my replacement was brought online (it happened to be me). Many things that I did were left undone. A contractor also made some good money off the organization while I was away. On my way out I tried to make my knowledge available but no one had time to pay attention.
Because I couldn't sell my house, I eventually came back to the old job (essentially with a 20% pay increase) after about 10 months. The gaps were never truly covered and 'customers' were alienated. For a business, they have to be able to handle the loss and figure out how to replace you...if necessary. At least, that's what should happen if management is smart.
That pretty much is the plan. FCOs (RSO in NASA-speak) will let the Shuttle fly until it is no longer controllable, unless the public is endangered. If the Shuttle is headed for the nearby cities, then it becomes a matter of 7 people on the Shuttle or 70 or more people just enjoying their day and hoping to watch a good launch. At that point the decision becomes much easier.
It's also an issue if the Shuttle blows up and the SRB manage to fly without tumbling, such as in the Challenger accident. The SRB destruct were activated on that mission.
There are two guys on each launch. Plus there are several support guys who are also trained or in training Mission Flight Control Officers (MFCO). RSO is just the term NASA calls them. Besides manned missions, they work every unmanned mission at the Cape. While they do discuss whether or not to take out a launch before doing so, when necessary, it only takes one to activate the destruct system and both are capable. The same system and controls are in use for both manned and unmanned launches.
These folks are Air Force, not NASA
In Florida, the state estimates an average of roughly 1.65 deaths per 100 million miles driven. Different states will have different numbers and obviously with an average, it will include many riskier events (drunk driving, street racing, etc.) along with your typical sunday drive probably being below this value. You could then pop the values in and get an estimate for a lifetime risk, but the value changes every year (it's been generally going down with time) http://www.flhsmv.gov/reports/crash_facts.html
Except that when it came to satellite radio, there was a good chance that the options were not whether it was going to be 2 or 1, but whether you had 1 or 0 satellite radio providers. Now, prices are almost certainly headed upwards for satellite radio, but if they adjust them too far, even a merged company will drive itself into bankruptcy.
Truthfully, it's 3 or 4 times a week but that's just because my two kids take up too much of our time and energy. My wife wanted it at least twice a day before kids, not that she necessarily got it that often. And I am much more of a geek than my wife is.
You forget, some people got married BEFORE they got a slashdot account. Those people will get laid once a month just like any other married guy with children.
While your argument is usually quite valid, these days the liquidity holds strongest. I tried selling my house and failed to find a buyer. The home is definitely value locked up pretty strongly, besides all the fees involved in selling/buying.
The time value of money does apply and in general to putting extra money towards a 30 year loan at 6%, the investment is the better choice. But inflation is something that should also be considered when comparing spending now or investing and spending later. Inflation may now be a serious consideration for all long term fiscal planning as the value of the money may be greater now than in future.
the tax writeoff is now always a guarantee. The interest on my home has not been large enough to claim since I owned it. The standard deduction exceeds what I can claim
Arcades that maximized their profit by elevating the playfield angle is part of the reason...3 balls instead of 5 was another. Touchy tilts. Poorly maintained and/or abused machines as well. I usually spent more of my arcade quarters on pinball than video games, but at some arcades it just wasn't worth it to play pinball. When it started to be all the arcades, I stopped playing them. The home machines were taking off as well.