The current proposal is a joke, really, it is expected to save 00.05% of U.S. daily oil usage for two months a year. We need to concentrate on changes that would actually, you know, make a difference.
I agree. Although I would enjoy not having to drive home in the dark, it hardly seems worth it from an energy standpoint. If you consider the savings over the year it is only 0.008%. On the other hand, I read that increasing fleet gas mileage just 3 mpg would save the U.S. about 1 million barrels of oil, or 5%, a day all year round. Of course that would probably require that people skip the SUV and perhaps get the four-banger instead of the V-6, so that ain't going to happen. Oh, and I heard that the automakers have these guys called lobbyists as well.
What do any of these have to do with new technologies? I guess the nuclear weapons one would qualify, but the continued existence of the human race has more to do with levelheaded diplomacy than an overaggeration of their destructive potential. All the rest of them pretty much relate to the earth's booming population in one way or another. Even the negative population growth promoting wackos would probably prefer to see that stemmed through less procreation rather than eliminating life preserving technologies.
Also, let's keep in mind that almost all taxes are based on a percentage of something: property value, income, amount of a sale. When you need to raise taxes, it means you aren't spending the money as efficiently as in the past.
This isn't necessarily true for a couple of reasons. For one, most schools are funded through property taxes, so if property values do not keep up with inflation (or assessments are not updated every year), then the school will effectively be getting less money. Also, if the population in the district is growing rapidly, the additional taxes the new residents bring in typically won't cover the higher upfront cost of building new schools to serve them. So, unless the town or county charges high new construction fees these costs need to be recouped through higher taxes.
Why drive all the way to Niagara falls when there are plenty of bars in Buffalo that no respectable person over the age of 21 would go to? (Is Mickey Rats still there?) Granted it is the best option if you are looking to get plastered, go to a nudie club, and then blow whatever remaining cash you have playing blackjack though.
I wonder if $0.50 air or $2.00/gal gasoline has the higher margin for them? Be funny if it was the air...
For the station owner, I am sure the air has the higher margin compared to a gallon of gas. It probably costs less than a penny to run the compressor for a minute. Most customers don't buy just one gallon of gas though and even free air pumps get used at only a small fraction of the frequency of a gas pump.
county income taxes! You have county income taxes? Where do you live, and more importantly why?
There are wide swaths of the U.S. that are not within any city limits. The people who live there get services from the county such as fire departments, police departments, road maintenance, schools, etc. Taxes are collected to pay for those services. City dwellers often pay the same county rate plus an additional levy to the city, so it isn't hard to see why one might choose to live just outside the city limits.
There is an interesting article in Scientific American this month in which the author proposes hybrid vehicles that you also plug in. The idea being that you charge the batteries overnight and for the first 30 miles or so your car runs totally on electric. Once the battery is at 50% capacity the car goes into regular hybrid mode. They did some analyses that indicated this could save mucho gas as a lot of commuters don't even go that 30 miles a day.
The downsides were that the cars would need bigger electric motors than currently found in hybrids and battery technology would need to advance a little bit too. Another issue is that if everyone in the U.S. used these cars, there would need to be like 200 additonal power plants built. Seems like an interesting idea though.
I asked them if Google had ever considered selling some of these statistics to businesses trying to analyze trends, just in bulk numbers (no privacy violations etc). I would figure it would be easy for them to implement, and another source of revenue. The presenters (who were actual engineers for Google, not just some PR folks) frowned upon that idea because they claimed that "it would not directly benefit end users."
Sure the engineers say they wouldn't do it and the PR folks probably would say they wouldn't do it, but what about the people who are in charge of watching the bottom line? I'm sure that there are/were some engineers at SCO that had no problem with Linux and look how that turned out. Besides even if they were just engineers, you can be sure that they are coached somewhat on how to promote the proper company image before they are sent out for these information sessions. I'm not saying that they were necessarily being dishonest but anytime a company is out promoting itself you have to take whatever is said with a grain of salt.
It is all relative though. Compared to a billion dollars (or whatever the number is) for one shuttle launch, a million dollars for an orbit or two would be cheap.
I had to laugh when I saw a poster state recently that, though he wasn't rich, he would be willing to spend thousands to get into orbit and even tens of thousands to go to the moon someday. Apparently he never looked into how much it would cost to fly around the world in a conventional airplane, or even across the Atlantic in the now defunct Concorde. Obviously there is a wide range of interpretations of the word cheap.
By the way, although it probably wouldn't cost millions to go up on SpaceShipOne, going to fully orbital flights is going to require quite a step up in sophistication and hence cost of the flights.
This is a very fine point, but based upon my reading of portions of the DMCA, Hymn seems to be in the clear if you can explain it properly to a jury.
Yeah, good luck with that. You would be very lucky if one of the jurors knew what the hell you were talking about. On the other hand, when the prosecutor (or plaintiff) gets up and says you stole music, they will all nod their heads and you're done.
I wonder if we have moved beyond the days of when a trial by a jury of your peers is really a good thing. I find the thought processes of most of my peers scary.
The problem is that we are using energy far quicker than it is created or the by products of energy production can be consumed......
All conservation does it make the energy source last longer it does not solve the under lying problem.
Speaking of false logic. Well, if we reduce energy consumption to a level that is less than the rate at which it is created then we have solved the problem as expressed in the first quoted sentence, no?
I'll admit that is not a likely scenario so that conserving itself does not solve the problem, but it isn't like we have to choosing between conserving and looking for alternative energy sources. Buying a CF bulb, taking the bus to work, and turning your thermostat down don't have any effect on whether a nuclear plant gets built or if fusion generators will be developed in the next decade. They do however reduce demand for fossil fuels and pollution. reducing demand also makes it easier to fill the gap with "green" energy than if using it wastefully.
I don't think accelerating towards a full blown energy crisis is any better than drawing it out.
Yet there are plenty of laws where there is no "victim". Laws against activities which are deemed to be against the good of the public, e.g. soliciting a prostitute, drunk driving, selling drugs, insider trading, etc., usually have no tangible victim associated with them. The accuser in those cases is usually the government (or rather "the people") and that is whom the accused faces in the courtroom.
are you sure that the The ultraviolet rays blocked by ozone are far too anemic to create or destroy C-14', they give you cancer so I assume they can produce free radicals and create carbon-14.
The first part of your assumption is correct but the second part is wrong. Creating a free radical requires providing enough energy to seperate two bonded atoms such as going from molecular to atomic oxygen. Ultraviolet radiation has enough energy to do this. Creating carbon-14 requires much higher energy radiation because it involves altering the nucleus of the atoms involved. This is like comparing the energy in a conventional exlosive to that of a nuclear bomb.
What businessman in their right mind would make this statement: "Our sales are through the roof! This must mean our prices are too low and we should raise them."
What businessman in their right mind would say: "Our sales our through the roof. People would probably be willing to pay more for our product with little drop off in sales and thus increase our profit margins, but let's not do that." Walmart is only able to keep their prices low because they leverage their suppliers to lower their prices and thus are able to maintain those low prices. Chasing customers with low prices doesn't work for everyone, just look at how some of the automakers and airlines have struggled lately. There is undoubtedly some sweet spot of pricing that will maximize profits from these downloads and apparently the Music Industry thinks it is higher than the current prices. Not saying it's the Right Thing(tm) for the consumer, but it is not necessarily the wrong thing for the sellers.
If someone leaves you something in their will, they want you to have it.
Or they have to leave it to somebody, so they figure why not you? I suppose some people might view a web domain as a cherished family heirloom, but a lot of others would view it as just another asset. I mean, if my grandfather left me 5000 shares of M$ stock, would it be wrong for me to sell them? Or do I have to get the paper stock certificates and display them in my house in some way?
Why would deleting those sites be illegal, though?
I would guess that by deleting the sites he would be destroying evidence. I don't think law enforcement looks upon that very favorably. On the other hand, I don't see why they wouldn't let him just block access to the pages in question.
Our own weather forecasters can't even get the weather correct 48 hours in advance most of the time (save for areas like the equator and extreme north/south, of course). Yet, we're supposed to believe that the climate can be accurately simulated for millions or billions of years by having a few hundred years of data and some simulations?
Predicting the local weather accurately for the next couple of days is vastly different than predicting changes in regional and global climate. The amount of available data and the coarseness of the simulation will make it difficult to predict exactly what is going to happen in every location, but the overall picture can still be valid. The weatherman may not know where exactly it is going to rain and how cold it will be, but he still knows that a cold front is coming and it will rain somewhere.
Regarding the rest of your post. I guess since "scientists" have been wrong in the past we should just disregard anything they tell us in the future as well and just trust our own intuition.
Third, Scientists have yet to prove (to my satisfaction) that the warming will have an over all detrimental impact to the human species (as opposed to it's benefits). Remember, warmer winters = less heating fuel/energy needed = less polution. (along with some other things such as a longer growing season in many places).
Your "benefits" are not necessarily so. Warmer winters = less heating, but warmer summers = more cooling. Not to mention that some predict that Europe could actually become colder. Longer growing season would be nice (although there isn't really a global shortage of food) but won't do much good if there is widespread drought. One certain consequence is that rising sea levels will be big trouble for a lot of coastal cities. On the other hand some inland dwellers could make a windfall selling there new beachfront property.
So... even though the government will pay more for health care for smokers than non-smokers, we shouldn't tax them more to make up for it. Gotcha.
I remember a study a few years back by a tobacco company that showed that smokers tend to not really cost the public any extra. I think the general idea was that everyone has to die of something at some point and the costs associated with the diseases that kill smokers aren't necessarily any more costly than the over ways of meeting one's end (except maybe for nice quick ones like a heart attack, but then smoking contributes to heart disease as well). Early deaths do result in some lost productivity, but most victims are probably retired or close to it, so there are some savings in regards to social security and long term care.
Since this was an industry study, naturally it needs to be regarded with some skepticism, but it seems somewhat plausible. While I think that banning smoking in public places is a good thing, it is difficult to determine to what extent you can tell others what they can do with their own bodies. Where do you draw the line that says these behaviors are too risky and must be discouraged/outlawed and these behaviors are risky but acceptable?
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I agree. Although I would enjoy not having to drive home in the dark, it hardly seems worth it from an energy standpoint. If you consider the savings over the year it is only 0.008%. On the other hand, I read that increasing fleet gas mileage just 3 mpg would save the U.S. about 1 million barrels of oil, or 5%, a day all year round. Of course that would probably require that people skip the SUV and perhaps get the four-banger instead of the V-6, so that ain't going to happen. Oh, and I heard that the automakers have these guys called lobbyists as well.
What do any of these have to do with new technologies? I guess the nuclear weapons one would qualify, but the continued existence of the human race has more to do with levelheaded diplomacy than an overaggeration of their destructive potential. All the rest of them pretty much relate to the earth's booming population in one way or another. Even the negative population growth promoting wackos would probably prefer to see that stemmed through less procreation rather than eliminating life preserving technologies.
This isn't necessarily true for a couple of reasons. For one, most schools are funded through property taxes, so if property values do not keep up with inflation (or assessments are not updated every year), then the school will effectively be getting less money. Also, if the population in the district is growing rapidly, the additional taxes the new residents bring in typically won't cover the higher upfront cost of building new schools to serve them. So, unless the town or county charges high new construction fees these costs need to be recouped through higher taxes.
Why drive all the way to Niagara falls when there are plenty of bars in Buffalo that no respectable person over the age of 21 would go to? (Is Mickey Rats still there?) Granted it is the best option if you are looking to get plastered, go to a nudie club, and then blow whatever remaining cash you have playing blackjack though.
For the station owner, I am sure the air has the higher margin compared to a gallon of gas. It probably costs less than a penny to run the compressor for a minute. Most customers don't buy just one gallon of gas though and even free air pumps get used at only a small fraction of the frequency of a gas pump.
Last I checked you did't seem to know the difference between an atom and a molecule.
Yeah the whole taxi thing sounds fishy, but I can't wait to find someone with a Google Gulp cap!
There are wide swaths of the U.S. that are not within any city limits. The people who live there get services from the county such as fire departments, police departments, road maintenance, schools, etc. Taxes are collected to pay for those services. City dwellers often pay the same county rate plus an additional levy to the city, so it isn't hard to see why one might choose to live just outside the city limits.
The downsides were that the cars would need bigger electric motors than currently found in hybrids and battery technology would need to advance a little bit too. Another issue is that if everyone in the U.S. used these cars, there would need to be like 200 additonal power plants built. Seems like an interesting idea though.
Sure the engineers say they wouldn't do it and the PR folks probably would say they wouldn't do it, but what about the people who are in charge of watching the bottom line? I'm sure that there are/were some engineers at SCO that had no problem with Linux and look how that turned out. Besides even if they were just engineers, you can be sure that they are coached somewhat on how to promote the proper company image before they are sent out for these information sessions. I'm not saying that they were necessarily being dishonest but anytime a company is out promoting itself you have to take whatever is said with a grain of salt.
I had to laugh when I saw a poster state recently that, though he wasn't rich, he would be willing to spend thousands to get into orbit and even tens of thousands to go to the moon someday. Apparently he never looked into how much it would cost to fly around the world in a conventional airplane, or even across the Atlantic in the now defunct Concorde. Obviously there is a wide range of interpretations of the word cheap.
By the way, although it probably wouldn't cost millions to go up on SpaceShipOne, going to fully orbital flights is going to require quite a step up in sophistication and hence cost of the flights.
Yeah, good luck with that. You would be very lucky if one of the jurors knew what the hell you were talking about. On the other hand, when the prosecutor (or plaintiff) gets up and says you stole music, they will all nod their heads and you're done.
I wonder if we have moved beyond the days of when a trial by a jury of your peers is really a good thing. I find the thought processes of most of my peers scary.
**IA sucks donkey balls!
Did Netcraft confirm that?
I know it can be a bother to RTFA but can't you even make it to the end of the blurb?
Speaking of false logic. Well, if we reduce energy consumption to a level that is less than the rate at which it is created then we have solved the problem as expressed in the first quoted sentence, no?
I'll admit that is not a likely scenario so that conserving itself does not solve the problem, but it isn't like we have to choosing between conserving and looking for alternative energy sources. Buying a CF bulb, taking the bus to work, and turning your thermostat down don't have any effect on whether a nuclear plant gets built or if fusion generators will be developed in the next decade. They do however reduce demand for fossil fuels and pollution. reducing demand also makes it easier to fill the gap with "green" energy than if using it wastefully.
I don't think accelerating towards a full blown energy crisis is any better than drawing it out.
Yet there are plenty of laws where there is no "victim". Laws against activities which are deemed to be against the good of the public, e.g. soliciting a prostitute, drunk driving, selling drugs, insider trading, etc., usually have no tangible victim associated with them. The accuser in those cases is usually the government (or rather "the people") and that is whom the accused faces in the courtroom.
The first part of your assumption is correct but the second part is wrong. Creating a free radical requires providing enough energy to seperate two bonded atoms such as going from molecular to atomic oxygen. Ultraviolet radiation has enough energy to do this. Creating carbon-14 requires much higher energy radiation because it involves altering the nucleus of the atoms involved. This is like comparing the energy in a conventional exlosive to that of a nuclear bomb.
What businessman in their right mind would say: "Our sales our through the roof. People would probably be willing to pay more for our product with little drop off in sales and thus increase our profit margins, but let's not do that." Walmart is only able to keep their prices low because they leverage their suppliers to lower their prices and thus are able to maintain those low prices. Chasing customers with low prices doesn't work for everyone, just look at how some of the automakers and airlines have struggled lately. There is undoubtedly some sweet spot of pricing that will maximize profits from these downloads and apparently the Music Industry thinks it is higher than the current prices. Not saying it's the Right Thing(tm) for the consumer, but it is not necessarily the wrong thing for the sellers.
Or they have to leave it to somebody, so they figure why not you? I suppose some people might view a web domain as a cherished family heirloom, but a lot of others would view it as just another asset. I mean, if my grandfather left me 5000 shares of M$ stock, would it be wrong for me to sell them? Or do I have to get the paper stock certificates and display them in my house in some way?
I would guess that by deleting the sites he would be destroying evidence. I don't think law enforcement looks upon that very favorably. On the other hand, I don't see why they wouldn't let him just block access to the pages in question.
Predicting the local weather accurately for the next couple of days is vastly different than predicting changes in regional and global climate. The amount of available data and the coarseness of the simulation will make it difficult to predict exactly what is going to happen in every location, but the overall picture can still be valid. The weatherman may not know where exactly it is going to rain and how cold it will be, but he still knows that a cold front is coming and it will rain somewhere.
Regarding the rest of your post. I guess since "scientists" have been wrong in the past we should just disregard anything they tell us in the future as well and just trust our own intuition.
Your "benefits" are not necessarily so. Warmer winters = less heating, but warmer summers = more cooling. Not to mention that some predict that Europe could actually become colder. Longer growing season would be nice (although there isn't really a global shortage of food) but won't do much good if there is widespread drought. One certain consequence is that rising sea levels will be big trouble for a lot of coastal cities. On the other hand some inland dwellers could make a windfall selling there new beachfront property.
I remember a study a few years back by a tobacco company that showed that smokers tend to not really cost the public any extra. I think the general idea was that everyone has to die of something at some point and the costs associated with the diseases that kill smokers aren't necessarily any more costly than the over ways of meeting one's end (except maybe for nice quick ones like a heart attack, but then smoking contributes to heart disease as well). Early deaths do result in some lost productivity, but most victims are probably retired or close to it, so there are some savings in regards to social security and long term care.
Since this was an industry study, naturally it needs to be regarded with some skepticism, but it seems somewhat plausible. While I think that banning smoking in public places is a good thing, it is difficult to determine to what extent you can tell others what they can do with their own bodies. Where do you draw the line that says these behaviors are too risky and must be discouraged/outlawed and these behaviors are risky but acceptable?