Everything other than the battery is either a lot simpler and will last longer than a car with an ICE (like the engine or the transmission) or it is the same. As far as I know, 10 year old Priuses are doing very well. Modern car batteries are not particularly toxic (no heavy metals) and they are too valuble to not recycle anyway.
You do realise this is like a report from a Saudi Arabian university proclaiming that electric vehicles will never work, right?
Norway strangely has the World's best incentives for EVs. There is almost no road tax, no sales tax (which is ridiculously high on other vehicles), free parking many places, no paying at toll roads and you can drive in the bus lane. I think we are trying to make up for our guilty conscience for getting filthy rich on oil.
I'm a Norwegian and I drive a Nissan Leaf, partly because it's very economical and partly because it is best for the environment. Almost all power in Norway is hydro-electric. I think it is better anyway since it shifts pollution to centralised power plants which are easier to replace or clean up in the future.
You could possibly make a case for Norway due to the oil, but there is absolutely no oil in Sweden or Iceland and the latter has handled the economic problems without imploding.
I wish more Americans could realize that a social security net is actually beneficial in a capitalist society, since it enables entrepreneurs to try to start their own business without jeopardizing their children's education or the family's health. Start a small company and you don't have to worry about health insurance for your workers. They have the same good coverage as anyone else. And insurance against unemployment, illness, permanent disability...
Since you play the size card: Organize at the state level. 28 states have a smaller population than Norway, and only 10 states have a larger population than Sweden. All of them are significantly smaller than fairly well-functioning Germany.
One last thing: Why on Earth do you allow such socialist interference in private business as government-mandated minimum wages? That would be unheard of, at least in Norway.
No. Gas usage is very uncommon in Norway. We just sell it and use electricity ourselves. The police has confirmed it is a bomb.
At least two people are killed.
That depends on how you calculate it. The income tax is usually about 30 % - 35 % for an ordinary income ($60k). The marginal tax rate is 47.8 % for income over $110k. In addition the employer has to pay a tax of 14.1 % of the employee's income that the employee never sees. It should probably be included. The VAT is a whopping 25 % (14 % on food).
If you make a lot of money, and spend most of it on non-food, it is probably possible to pass 60 %, but that is rare.
I would also say the numbers are misleading without some information on what you get. Norway, like the rest of Europe, has universal heath care so there is no health insurance to pay, no matter what preconditions you may have. The taxes also include unemployment benefits, a pension plan and 100 % pay for a year if you can't work due to illness. Comparing tax rates without accounting for insurances you absolutely need to have is not fair.
The knowledge that the earth was round lasted through the dark ages too. When Columbus was laughed at by the church' experts, they didn't point out that the world was flat, but that Columbus used a too small value for the circumference of the earth. Therefore he would starve to death before reaching Asia. They were right, Columbus was just very lucky to hit America before it happened.
Generally, the dark ages weren't nearly as dark as historians from the 19th century depicted it to be.
You do realise that you count in base-10? Before the advent of the decimal point, which is quite new actually, units in base-12 may have been convenient, but now they are rather meaningless.
By the way, how many inches in a mile? Is the US system really base-12?
Please read the ACs' replies to this, there's an error in your maths. The Sun provides a lot more power than what your calculations tell. Even with 10 % efficient solar cells, only a small fraction of the Sahara would have to be covered to supply the entire world with all the energy we need. Of course, the solar cells would be distributed. I've seen an estimate that covering the parking lots in the US with solar cells would generate enough energy for the country's own use. We will not run out of space.
Electric motors don't need geared transmission. Also, the engine itself contains far fewer moving parts. Electric motors are superior to internal combustion engines (ICE) in every way, except energy storage. We're working on that...
The ICE in a hybrid runs at constant speed and powers a generator. That's also simpler than an ordinary car.
1) It DOES make sense. By not paying for services used - in the case above, tire balancing.. in software piracy, coding services of the many hard working programmers that made the software a reality - you rob the people who provide those services of the money they are entitled to.
Sorry, still doesn't make sense. There is no extra cost involved for the software company in making an extra copy. This analogy works for the situation that someone orders a custom-built program and then takes it without paying. That is not what software piracy is about.
AFAIK the cost of the turbines is not significant, they last for a long time without being much more complicated than a simple electric motor run "backwards". (Building dams are expensive, running them costs next to nothing.) The limiting factor for a hydroelectric powerplant is usually water. If we can use solar by day, we can hold back water in the reservoires and use it by night (and on bad-weather days). That is a type of battery with absolutely no energy loss.
The real beauty of hydro-electric power is that it can be adjusted to meet need virtually instantly. If there's a surge in demand, a turbine can increase output in just seconds (as long as it's not running at full capacity already), power plants based on boiling water (think oil, coal and nuclear) need hours to adjust. The latter are good for supplying steady power, which is most needed by day, but that's something that solar power is well suited for too.
The best way of supplying energy in the future would be to use a variety of sources: solar, wind, tidal and then back up with hydro electric power plants in reserve. It's even fairly energy efficient to use surplus energy by day to pump water to high-level reservoires.
There are much better ways of storing the energy than using battery banks, especially when you don't have to carry the storage around (think cars). Many places hydro-electric power and solar cells could be run togehther very efficiently. Shut down turbines and save water in the reservoire when there is much sun, restart them at night.
Huygens was sending on both channel A and B, but someone forgot to turn on the receivers for channel A on Cassini, which was to work as a relay between Huygens and Earth. Luckily, some ultra-sensitive radio telescopes on Earth managed to pick up some of the signal directly from Huygens.
I think you missed the point. Linus does not deny that open source development can lead you to a good job. He just doesn't want the kind of people who are into open source only for the (future) money, he prefers idealists. Being offered a good job should be a side-effect, not the motivation.
Haven't we been clearing up this a gazillion times on Slashdot by now? You can NOT demand the source from anyone just because it's GPL. If someone distributes binaries, then they must also supply the source. Solution: Don't distribute outside your organisation if you want to keep your changes secret.
Remember it's a bad idea to distribute binaries of something you would like to keep secret anyway, it could always be reverse-engineered.
His theories are not necessarily right, but when it comes to speeds they describe very well what we actually observe. It's simpler to refer to Einstein who found equations that describe the behaviour, than refering to the tons of research that showed the speed of light was constant.
That argumant is SO 1700's. You simply can't add speeds that way, unless the speeds involved are so low that there are only negligable relativistic effects. Read a little Einstein, the speed of light is constant, no matter who measures it or who produces the light.
In the 70's, very few scientists supported the fear of a new ice age. Nowadays, a large majority of them believe that human behaviour causes global warming. The situation is not comparable to the 70's and we have a lot more reason to worry.
Why use farmland? Why not use rooftops and parking lots instead? Contrary to what most people believe, solar energy does NOT require much land, look here.
I haven't got a source at hand right now, but IIRC solar energy doesn't require any more land than conventional energy. Remember, even oil wells, coal mines, dams and nuclear power plants need some space.
Slashdot Mirror
Everything other than the battery is either a lot simpler and will last longer than a car with an ICE (like the engine or the transmission) or it is the same. As far as I know, 10 year old Priuses are doing very well. Modern car batteries are not particularly toxic (no heavy metals) and they are too valuble to not recycle anyway.
You do realise this is like a report from a Saudi Arabian university proclaiming that electric vehicles will never work, right?
Norway strangely has the World's best incentives for EVs. There is almost no road tax, no sales tax (which is ridiculously high on other vehicles), free parking many places, no paying at toll roads and you can drive in the bus lane. I think we are trying to make up for our guilty conscience for getting filthy rich on oil.
I'm a Norwegian and I drive a Nissan Leaf, partly because it's very economical and partly because it is best for the environment. Almost all power in Norway is hydro-electric. I think it is better anyway since it shifts pollution to centralised power plants which are easier to replace or clean up in the future.
I wish more Americans could realize that a social security net is actually beneficial in a capitalist society, since it enables entrepreneurs to try to start their own business without jeopardizing their children's education or the family's health. Start a small company and you don't have to worry about health insurance for your workers. They have the same good coverage as anyone else. And insurance against unemployment, illness, permanent disability...
Since you play the size card: Organize at the state level. 28 states have a smaller population than Norway, and only 10 states have a larger population than Sweden. All of them are significantly smaller than fairly well-functioning Germany.
One last thing: Why on Earth do you allow such socialist interference in private business as government-mandated minimum wages? That would be unheard of, at least in Norway.
No. Gas usage is very uncommon in Norway. We just sell it and use electricity ourselves. The police has confirmed it is a bomb. At least two people are killed.
But your teeth will be cleaned by an invisible hand! Isn't that convenient!?
If you make a lot of money, and spend most of it on non-food, it is probably possible to pass 60 %, but that is rare.
I would also say the numbers are misleading without some information on what you get. Norway, like the rest of Europe, has universal heath care so there is no health insurance to pay, no matter what preconditions you may have. The taxes also include unemployment benefits, a pension plan and 100 % pay for a year if you can't work due to illness. Comparing tax rates without accounting for insurances you absolutely need to have is not fair.
Probably Semmelweis.
Generally, the dark ages weren't nearly as dark as historians from the 19th century depicted it to be.
By the way, how many inches in a mile? Is the US system really base-12?
Eastern Norway and Northern Sweden, yes. But not Denmark. Denmark is actually sinking slightly.
Please read the ACs' replies to this, there's an error in your maths. The Sun provides a lot more power than what your calculations tell. Even with 10 % efficient solar cells, only a small fraction of the Sahara would have to be covered to supply the entire world with all the energy we need. Of course, the solar cells would be distributed. I've seen an estimate that covering the parking lots in the US with solar cells would generate enough energy for the country's own use. We will not run out of space.
The upper limit, known as the Chandrasekhar limit, for a white dwarf is 1.4 solar masses (more or less).
The ICE in a hybrid runs at constant speed and powers a generator. That's also simpler than an ordinary car.
Sorry, still doesn't make sense. There is no extra cost involved for the software company in making an extra copy. This analogy works for the situation that someone orders a custom-built program and then takes it without paying. That is not what software piracy is about.
Question: What kind of engine produced the necessary torque and initiated the movement?
(Hint: It was not the IC engine!)
The real beauty of hydro-electric power is that it can be adjusted to meet need virtually instantly. If there's a surge in demand, a turbine can increase output in just seconds (as long as it's not running at full capacity already), power plants based on boiling water (think oil, coal and nuclear) need hours to adjust. The latter are good for supplying steady power, which is most needed by day, but that's something that solar power is well suited for too.
The best way of supplying energy in the future would be to use a variety of sources: solar, wind, tidal and then back up with hydro electric power plants in reserve. It's even fairly energy efficient to use surplus energy by day to pump water to high-level reservoires.
There are much better ways of storing the energy than using battery banks, especially when you don't have to carry the storage around (think cars). Many places hydro-electric power and solar cells could be run togehther very efficiently. Shut down turbines and save water in the reservoire when there is much sun, restart them at night.
Huygens was sending on both channel A and B, but someone forgot to turn on the receivers for channel A on Cassini, which was to work as a relay between Huygens and Earth. Luckily, some ultra-sensitive radio telescopes on Earth managed to pick up some of the signal directly from Huygens.
Cough, cough....
s/astrology/astronomy/
cough, cough...
I think you missed the point. Linus does not deny that open source development can lead you to a good job. He just doesn't want the kind of people who are into open source only for the (future) money, he prefers idealists. Being offered a good job should be a side-effect, not the motivation.
Remember it's a bad idea to distribute binaries of something you would like to keep secret anyway, it could always be reverse-engineered.
His theories are not necessarily right, but when it comes to speeds they describe very well what we actually observe. It's simpler to refer to Einstein who found equations that describe the behaviour, than refering to the tons of research that showed the speed of light was constant.
That argumant is SO 1700's. You simply can't add speeds that way, unless the speeds involved are so low that there are only negligable relativistic effects. Read a little Einstein, the speed of light is constant, no matter who measures it or who produces the light.
In the 70's, very few scientists supported the fear of a new ice age. Nowadays, a large majority of them believe that human behaviour causes global warming. The situation is not comparable to the 70's and we have a lot more reason to worry.
I haven't got a source at hand right now, but IIRC solar energy doesn't require any more land than conventional energy. Remember, even oil wells, coal mines, dams and nuclear power plants need some space.