Some part of the human race will start breeding at a higher rate despite education and penicillin. And then it will come to dominate the culture within a hundred years.
That hasn't been the case-- my morning commute is 95% freeways. School traffic hasn't played a factor in the past. On mondays and fridays the freeways have no traffic at all now (65-75 all the way from home to work).
I agree that school is a factor in traffic generally. But I live 1/2 mile from the freeway and then work a 1/2 mile from the free way on the other end.
We are going to breed until there is a mass die off to disease or stripping our environment.
---
Look,
If I looked out to see and saw a 1/4 mile high tsunami coming in about 2 miles away, what would the point be. It wouldn't be evil to say, "here it comes" and have a sip from my nice tropical drink and snag a kiss from the girl next to me before we die.
If I saw a 10 mile asteroid was on the way just outside he orbit of the moon, same thing.
---
We can't stop this. It's too late.
I'm hoping to die of natural causes before it gets too bad. The current projections are 9-10 billion about my likely death year.
---
I still go to work, I still invest in the market, I'm still happy.
Already, Iran is stacking up tankers *to fill with oil* because their *land-based* storage tanks are full. then the oil *countries* STILL have to pay the bills
Why would the saudi's sell oil for $10 when they could sell it for $34?
Because they can't.
Every day this goes on, the longer oil prices will be low.
Every day, more people start carpooling, move closer to work, replace a 13mpg truck with a 31mpg (or higher) car, start riding public transportation, start working from home 2 days a week, start working 9/80 schedules.
My morning commute is now consistently 5 minutes faster in the morning and 15 minutes faster in the evening because the number of cars on the road has dropped that much.
Already, Iran is stacking up tankers because their online storage tanks are full.
Already our national gas usage is down about 4% in one month.
The current prices are caused by speculation. The same bubble of excess wealth passing through it that passed through the stock market in 1996-2000, housing in 2002-2005, and commodities now. The true "last barrel" cost of producing oil right now is about $50 a barrel. Everything over that is excess.
Once demand drops like a stone, then the oil companies STILL have to pay the bills. A lot of them are spending money like water. A very few of them are investing the current profits wisely.
They will sell oil to whoever will buy it- because just like the average salaryman in the U.S., they are just a couple paychecks from being homeless.
Well, my statement was a bit of an over generalization.
You are completely correct that if we eat/burn the ground cover in an area, that's it. Likewise, we lost a lot in the dust bowl. It doesn't recover from over-fishing.
But most "horrible, terrible" *pollution* activities, the earth basically recovers from in 20-40 years as long as we frikkin stop doing it.
Alaska could probably handle being drilled for oil and not show any real signs 40 years later.
One thing to keep in mind is that the longer oil is at $130+, the longer it will be at $70 or less.
Very likely we are looking at $60 to $70 oil for about 3-5 years. The best thing the government could do to get us off oil would be to set a minimum price of $100. That brings a lot of energy sources out of the woodwork when they can count on profits. They won't invest in $80 energy when there is a big chance of $60 for 3-5 years in the near future.
And hey.. if prices are going to stay $130 forever, then a $100 floor won't matter.
Yes, if we reduce the environment to rock, that's it.
However, oil spills it hasn't done as badly with. And nuclear it seems to be doing quite well with.
General pollution, it's fine with.
What it isn't fine with is continuously adding stuff until it completely overloads and collapses.
Again-- too many people. Too many people do the same thing as deer and strip their environment until they destroy it and all die off. It doesn't matter what we do. If 6 billion people go to ANYTHING they will destroy it. And we are headed towards 9 to 11 billion last I heard.
I say, save the oil in alaska and use it for truly priceless stuff when it runs out everywhere else.
Given all the yammering-- it's clear if oil was 300 a barrel, alaska would be covered with pipes. so we *will* drill there someday. just a question of when .
Who cares about the environment, it can recover in 20-40 years.
Average Prices of Selected Fuels and Electricity, 1980-2006 (In dollars per unit, except electricity, in cents per kWh. Represents price to end-users, except as noted) http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0908464.html 5.36 in 1980 10.40 in 2006
Now, some of those companies offering 13c/kwh are going bankrupt and customers are stuck at 24c/kwh for 3 to 4 months before being allowed back in a company that offers 14 ish c/kwh.
As the poster below indicated, you may be benefiting from earlier investments in renewable power.
In Texas, our oil, coal, & gas (with some nukes) based power has gone from 5.3 (1983) to 16 cents (today). I know from my research on solar. It was not a spike overnight- it was a nice slow rise.
In fact, the spot market is running 24 cents (which people are being dumped on for 3-4 months when their tiny power companies go bankrupt)
However, electricity has tripled in the last 20 years from 5.3 to 16~ish cents. Assuming in the next 20 years, it does the same... then 1,280 would be roughly $430 adjusted for inflation- which will be a huge bargain.
Well the context is that programming isn't fun in general.
I agree there will always be some exceptional places.
In my experience with startups/small companies... HIGH degree of freedom LOW accountability (which drives you crazy if you get shackled to a loser on a project) POOR pay short term relative to HIGH hours worked (lol- they provided a friend of mine cots and dinner in his office).
---
I have friends for whom the freedom and the coolness of working with a bunch of hotshots makes up for the bad parts.
For me, I left that in 2000 and now am a salary man. I stopped building my own PC's in 2003. My last java coding was in 2006. That system will be thrown away in 2013 to 2015.
The tech side just isn't worth it. It changes every 3-6 months and the compensation doesn't cover the risks and "on-call" / after hours work. And my wrists can't handle hands down development any more.
For the first 20 years, being a developer was cool. You were a hero, you worked during emergencies, you had a bit of freedom as a result, the pay was decent- never superior unless you became a contractor. And there is/was a problem with constantly becoming obsolete and having to retrain a lot more than other professions.
I finally left to be project leader and then a team leader. I see my developers suffering from the boredom.
It's mostly SOX. It's also a view of developers as generic by management. Executives do NOT WANT heroes. They want grey reliable processes that consistently take 3 times as long (and are not random between 1/10th as long and 10 times as long without anyway to predict it).
Programming in business is just not fun like it used to be. It's okay- but you code about 1/10th as much as you used to because of all the paperwork overhead. And you are a LOT more accountable. this is a good thing for slackers but it stifles the good people.
I think that is more in line with changes in ethics than science.
A majority used to think abortion was bad (tho oddly not leaving the child out to die if it wasn't wanted or torturing people in front of children). Now a 50/50 or even 55/45 split exists.
I promise never to allow financial gain, competitiveness or ambition
>> ambition is what drives a lot of scientists. I want to do this first, not second. >> of course many scientists want financial gain. I want to be frikkin rich just like anyone else that works their tail end off for 20 years. Why should a scientist be uniquely sacrificial of their personal well-being. At the least, their professors and universities expect to be paid back the up to 400,000 dollar tuitions.
cloud my judgment in the conduct of
>>ethical: This word is very hard to define in a stable fashion. Things that were ethical only 20 years ago are now unethical. Things that were unethical 20 years ago became ethical (in part because people just kept doing them)
research and scholarship. I will pursue knowledge and create knowledge for the greater good,
but never to the detriment of colleagues, supervisors, research subjects or the international community of scholars
>> Scientists have forever competed. Hmm I've discovered a new truth that will absolutely destroy an entire wing of science. I better not let that out since I don't want to do something to the detriment of those guys.
of which I am now a member.
---
Pointless and even harmful to those fools who might be tricked into following it.
The only statement I might take out of it is..
I will pursue knowledge and create knowledge for the greater good.
But "greater good" is still a little hard to define. Different societies have wildly different definitions of what constitutes the greater good (along "do we consider clan/family/individual most important" and along other lines as well.
---
And not to sound like a republican, but the entire thing sound a bit communistic too- especially the part about financial gain. So it is couched in communistic/left leaning values to begin with.
1) You could download and watch "battle star galactica" but it wasn't even viewable for free in the US until a year later. These days I watch it on Sci-Fi because it is current. 2) Ally McBeal for some ODD reason had 5-8 episodes available here but all the rest were only available on UK encoded disks. 3) "Circle of Iron" was only on video tape for several years. I downloaded a rip of a video tape and then purchased the DVD when it FINALLY (after several years) became available. 4) The "Time Travelers" is STILL NOT available except as a burned rip (which I purchased and it wouldn't play). 5) Several science fiction shows (Like Logan's Run), D&D Animated 6) Get Smart (Watched some horrible encodings of it for several years before the DVD set finally came out (And I BOUGHT it). 7) The American Success Company (retitled "Success")(Video Tape only- out of print for years)
That's just off the top of my head.
A LOT of shows and movies go out of print and do not come out on the newer technologies. There will be a lot of movies printed on DVD that you will not be able to purchase (on DVD) a few years into Blu Ray and they won't be out on BluRay yet.
Likewise, they don't make handy 700mb versions of the DVD's I already own. I lost TWO DVD's last trip alone.
I know people who play multiple toons and feel they are doing as well as if they were on one toon... and they are not. (However, they are better coordinated with themselves since they know exactly when the other toon is going to do something).
You can drive one car (and change the radio, flip the signals, press the pedal) okay.
You really can't drive two cars that well tho. A lot of modern life seems to be about wanting us to drive two cars at the same time.
I agree with your general point and agree that recent material that is still in print should be either paid for or ignored.
That being said, I torrent.
I use it for 1) Movies that I can't buy if I want to. 2) Comics that I grew up with and can't buy if I want to. 3) Anime that isn't for sale in the U.S. (This has lead to be buying anime when it does become available- like Stand Alone Complex)
And I do draw the line 28 years (the original terms before our governments sold out to disney and other companies and sold away the public domain to them). And I could get fined or go to jail for that activity. I keep that in mind, so I use peer guardian and other techniques to keep a low profile. But mainly, I stay away from new hot shit. Mostly, new hot movies you can buy for $5-$7.50 within 18 months of them coming out. Why risk prison/ fines to see a movie 18 months early? And more importantly, creators do deserve *some* compensation for creating.
In my experience with women (and I'm good looking and successful)...
1) get them alone... dinner, tv, trip to the beach... you have to be alone tho. 2) despite the fact that they are flustered, half naked, and pawing all over you, until you do it the first time, you never talk about it-- if you talk about it or address what they are doing too soon, they run away. 3) always make sure they get their cookie and very soon you'll hear about how rare and wonderful you are compared to the other guys they've been with. But you have to not be trying to do it, you have to do it because you love doing it. If you are trying to do it, then they feel it and it becomes a problem. This means when they do get their cookie, you are even more enthusiastic and wanting to continue until they ask you to stop (and why some women are afraid of having multiple orgasms has confused me. The ones who do talk about the fear of losing control.)
I've never known anyone, or had any personal success with being direct. Everything I see and know has been "walk up to it sideways to make it work." I read about some men that do and not all of them are attractive. I get the feeling that is rare.
So I'd miss my shot at you. Nothing bad about that-- plenty of others who fit my personal style.
Slashdot Mirror
Picture education and income as penicillin.
Some part of the human race will start breeding at a higher rate despite education and penicillin.
And then it will come to dominate the culture within a hundred years.
That hasn't been the case-- my morning commute is 95% freeways. School traffic hasn't played a factor in the past. On mondays and fridays the freeways have no traffic at all now (65-75 all the way from home to work).
I agree that school is a factor in traffic generally. But I live 1/2 mile from the freeway and then work a 1/2 mile from the free way on the other end.
There will be pipelines and there will be leaks.
With the current global warming (which I do *not* attribute to human activity), the permafrost is going to become treacherous.
Likewise the humans that live there for the projects will pollute.
My position (in this thread) is that 20-40 years later, it won't matter- the earth will heal from a few simple oil spills and drilling.
But why drill now-- wait until it is really rare, we have better drilling & recovery techniques.
Only risk is we will get in a financial hurt and sell it to some foreign country.
Because nothing you or I do is going to stop it.
We are going to breed until there is a mass die off to disease or stripping our environment.
---
Look,
If I looked out to see and saw a 1/4 mile high tsunami coming in about 2 miles away, what would the point be.
It wouldn't be evil to say, "here it comes" and have a sip from my nice tropical drink and snag a kiss from the girl next to me before we die.
If I saw a 10 mile asteroid was on the way just outside he orbit of the moon, same thing.
---
We can't stop this. It's too late.
I'm hoping to die of natural causes before it gets too bad. The current projections are 9-10 billion about my likely death year.
---
I still go to work, I still invest in the market, I'm still happy.
If I *could* stop it, then I might care more.
I hate slashdot for it's lack of editing.
Already, Iran is stacking up tankers *to fill with oil* because their *land-based* storage tanks are full.
then the oil *countries* STILL have to pay the bills
Oil was $10 a barrel in 1999.
That's down from $34 in 1982 (about $80 in 1999 inflation-adjusted dollars).
http://www.ioga.com/Special/crudeoil_Hist.htm
Why would the saudi's sell oil for $10 when they could sell it for $34?
Because they can't.
Every day this goes on, the longer oil prices will be low.
Every day, more people start carpooling, move closer to work, replace a 13mpg truck with a 31mpg (or higher) car, start riding public transportation, start working from home 2 days a week, start working 9/80 schedules.
My morning commute is now consistently 5 minutes faster in the morning and 15 minutes faster in the evening because the number of cars on the road has dropped that much.
Already, Iran is stacking up tankers because their online storage tanks are full.
Already our national gas usage is down about 4% in one month.
The current prices are caused by speculation. The same bubble of excess wealth passing through it that passed through the stock market in 1996-2000, housing in 2002-2005, and commodities now. The true "last barrel" cost of producing oil right now is about $50 a barrel. Everything over that is excess.
Once demand drops like a stone, then the oil companies STILL have to pay the bills. A lot of them are spending money like water. A very few of them are investing the current profits wisely.
They will sell oil to whoever will buy it- because just like the average salaryman in the U.S., they are just a couple paychecks from being homeless.
Closing on 7 billion now.
10 billion on my likely death year.
http://www.ibiblio.org/lunarbin/worldpop
http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/popclockworld.html
Well, my statement was a bit of an over generalization.
You are completely correct that if we eat/burn the ground cover in an area, that's it.
Likewise, we lost a lot in the dust bowl. It doesn't recover from over-fishing.
But most "horrible, terrible" *pollution* activities, the earth basically recovers from in 20-40 years as long as we frikkin stop doing it.
Alaska could probably handle being drilled for oil and not show any real signs 40 years later.
One thing to keep in mind is that the longer oil is at $130+, the longer it will be at $70 or less.
Very likely we are looking at $60 to $70 oil for about 3-5 years. The best thing the government could do to get us off oil would be to set a minimum price of $100. That brings a lot of energy sources out of the woodwork when they can count on profits. They won't invest in $80 energy when there is a big chance of $60 for 3-5 years in the near future.
And hey.. if prices are going to stay $130 forever, then a $100 floor won't matter.
I think my next box will be linux. It's time to try again.
I bounced off of open office from 1.02 to 2.4- I preferred 2.4 to Word after about a month of usage. 3.0 and onwards looks to only be better.
Same thing with linux. It looks like it is getting close-- I'm thinking a fit-pc or something like that to start.
Keep my windows beast for Everquest I, but maybe all my art, browsing, etc, over to linux by december.
Yes, if we reduce the environment to rock, that's it.
However, oil spills it hasn't done as badly with.
And nuclear it seems to be doing quite well with.
General pollution, it's fine with.
What it isn't fine with is continuously adding stuff until it completely overloads and collapses.
Again-- too many people. Too many people do the same thing as deer and strip their environment until they destroy it and all die off. It doesn't matter what we do. If 6 billion people go to ANYTHING they will destroy it. And we are headed towards 9 to 11 billion last I heard.
Your view is overly simplistic.
Interest Rates went to 1-2%. That is why houses got so expensive at first, then the financing industry went crazy.
I say, save the oil in alaska and use it for truly priceless stuff when it runs out everywhere else.
Given all the yammering-- it's clear if oil was 300 a barrel, alaska would be covered with pipes. so we *will* drill there someday. just a question of when .
Who cares about the environment, it can recover in 20-40 years.
Real problem is still TOO MANY PEOPLE.
Your chart is in "REAL", I.e. Inflation Adjusted... Dollars.
In other words, you work 10% less to earn the money for electricity today. But it still went up 3x in price.
I.e., in 1980, you made $30k for a professional job that pays $92k today.
Your electricity went from 5 cents to 14 cents-- you work slighly less time to earn 14 cents than you did to earn 5 cents.
Average Prices of Selected Fuels and Electricity, 1980-2006
(In dollars per unit, except electricity, in cents per kWh. Represents price to end-users, except as noted)
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0908464.html
5.36 in 1980
10.40 in 2006
http://www.energymarketexchange.com/emex/index_zip
put in a texas zip and see 13.27 to 15.44 in 2008 (today)
Now, some of those companies offering 13c/kwh are going bankrupt and customers are stuck at 24c/kwh for 3 to 4 months before being allowed back in a company that offers 14 ish c/kwh.
Inflation is very sneaky.
As the poster below indicated, you may be benefiting from earlier investments in renewable power.
In Texas, our oil, coal, & gas (with some nukes) based power has gone from 5.3 (1983) to 16 cents (today). I know from my research on solar. It was not a spike overnight- it was a nice slow rise.
In fact, the spot market is running 24 cents (which people are being dumped on for 3-4 months when their tiny power companies go bankrupt)
You have an excellent point...
However, electricity has tripled in the last 20 years from 5.3 to 16~ish cents. Assuming in the next 20 years, it does the same... then 1,280 would be roughly $430 adjusted for inflation- which will be a huge bargain.
Well the context is that programming isn't fun in general.
I agree there will always be some exceptional places.
In my experience with startups/small companies...
HIGH degree of freedom
LOW accountability (which drives you crazy if you get shackled to a loser on a project)
POOR pay short term relative to
HIGH hours worked (lol- they provided a friend of mine cots and dinner in his office).
---
I have friends for whom the freedom and the coolness of working with a bunch of hotshots makes up for the bad parts.
For me, I left that in 2000 and now am a salary man. I stopped building my own PC's in 2003. My last java coding was in 2006. That system will be thrown away in 2013 to 2015.
The tech side just isn't worth it. It changes every 3-6 months and the compensation doesn't cover the risks and "on-call" / after hours work.
And my wrists can't handle hands down development any more.
More power to people that still enjoy it.
For the first 20 years, being a developer was cool. You were a hero, you worked during emergencies, you had a bit of freedom as a result, the pay was decent- never superior unless you became a contractor. And there is/was a problem with constantly becoming obsolete and having to retrain a lot more than other professions.
I finally left to be project leader and then a team leader. I see my developers suffering from the boredom.
It's mostly SOX. It's also a view of developers as generic by management. Executives do NOT WANT heroes. They want grey reliable processes that consistently take 3 times as long (and are not random between 1/10th as long and 10 times as long without anyway to predict it).
Programming in business is just not fun like it used to be. It's okay- but you code about 1/10th as much as you used to because of all the paperwork overhead. And you are a LOT more accountable. this is a good thing for slackers but it stifles the good people.
I think that is more in line with changes in ethics than science.
A majority used to think abortion was bad (tho oddly not leaving the child out to die if it wasn't wanted or torturing people in front of children). Now a 50/50 or even 55/45 split exists.
I promise never to allow financial gain, competitiveness or ambition
>> ambition is what drives a lot of scientists. I want to do this first, not second.
>> of course many scientists want financial gain. I want to be frikkin rich just like anyone else that works their tail end off for 20 years. Why should a scientist be uniquely sacrificial of their personal well-being. At the least, their professors and universities expect to be paid back the up to 400,000 dollar tuitions.
cloud my judgment in the conduct of
>>ethical: This word is very hard to define in a stable fashion. Things that were ethical only 20 years ago are now unethical. Things that were unethical 20 years ago became ethical (in part because people just kept doing them)
research and scholarship. I will pursue knowledge and create knowledge for the greater good,
but never to the detriment of colleagues, supervisors, research subjects or the international community of scholars
>> Scientists have forever competed. Hmm I've discovered a new truth that will absolutely destroy an entire wing of science. I better not let that out since I don't want to do something to the detriment of those guys.
of which I am now a member.
---
Pointless and even harmful to those fools who might be tricked into following it.
The only statement I might take out of it is..
I will pursue knowledge and create knowledge for the greater good.
But "greater good" is still a little hard to define.
Different societies have wildly different definitions of what constitutes the greater good (along "do we consider clan/family/individual most important" and along other lines as well.
---
And not to sound like a republican, but the entire thing sound a bit communistic too- especially the part about financial gain.
So it is couched in communistic/left leaning values to begin with.
For a long time...
1) You could download and watch "battle star galactica" but it wasn't even viewable for free in the US until a year later. These days I watch it on Sci-Fi because it is current.
2) Ally McBeal for some ODD reason had 5-8 episodes available here but all the rest were only available on UK encoded disks.
3) "Circle of Iron" was only on video tape for several years. I downloaded a rip of a video tape and then purchased the DVD when it FINALLY (after several years) became available.
4) The "Time Travelers" is STILL NOT available except as a burned rip (which I purchased and it wouldn't play).
5) Several science fiction shows (Like Logan's Run), D&D Animated
6) Get Smart (Watched some horrible encodings of it for several years before the DVD set finally came out (And I BOUGHT it).
7) The American Success Company (retitled "Success")(Video Tape only- out of print for years)
That's just off the top of my head.
A LOT of shows and movies go out of print and do not come out on the newer technologies. There will be a lot of movies printed on DVD that you will not be able to purchase (on DVD) a few years into Blu Ray and they won't be out on BluRay yet.
Likewise, they don't make handy 700mb versions of the DVD's I already own. I lost TWO DVD's last trip alone.
I know people who play multiple toons and feel they are doing as well as if they were on one toon... and they are not. (However, they are better coordinated with themselves since they know exactly when the other toon is going to do something).
You can drive one car (and change the radio, flip the signals, press the pedal) okay.
You really can't drive two cars that well tho. A lot of modern life seems to be about wanting us to drive two cars at the same time.
I agree with your general point and agree that recent material that is still in print should be either paid for or ignored.
That being said, I torrent.
I use it for
1) Movies that I can't buy if I want to.
2) Comics that I grew up with and can't buy if I want to.
3) Anime that isn't for sale in the U.S. (This has lead to be buying anime when it does become available- like Stand Alone Complex)
And I do draw the line 28 years (the original terms before our governments sold out to disney and other companies and sold away the public domain to them). And I could get fined or go to jail for that activity. I keep that in mind, so I use peer guardian and other techniques to keep a low profile. But mainly, I stay away from new hot shit. Mostly, new hot movies you can buy for $5-$7.50 within 18 months of them coming out. Why risk prison/ fines to see a movie 18 months early? And more importantly, creators do deserve *some* compensation for creating.
In my experience with women (and I'm good looking and successful)...
1) get them alone... dinner, tv, trip to the beach... you have to be alone tho.
2) despite the fact that they are flustered, half naked, and pawing all over you, until you do it the first time, you never talk about it-- if you talk about it or address what they are doing too soon, they run away.
3) always make sure they get their cookie and very soon you'll hear about how rare and wonderful you are compared to the other guys they've been with. But you have to not be trying to do it, you have to do it because you love doing it. If you are trying to do it, then they feel it and it becomes a problem. This means when they do get their cookie, you are even more enthusiastic and wanting to continue until they ask you to stop (and why some women are afraid of having multiple orgasms has confused me. The ones who do talk about the fear of losing control.)
I've never known anyone, or had any personal success with being direct. Everything I see and know has been "walk up to it sideways to make it work." I read about some men that do and not all of them are attractive. I get the feeling that is rare.
So I'd miss my shot at you. Nothing bad about that-- plenty of others who fit my personal style.