Why do Americans generally tend to think that the problems in other parts of the world won't somehow find their way here, especially disease and famine. If global warming produces enough erratic weather it is not all inconceivable that one could get one or two consecutive growing too dry or too wet or possibly both Springs that essentially eliminate the growing seasons of most food crops, particularly now that vast infestations of numerous insect, fungal, and bacterial species from the tropics have largely eliminate most of the natural and human bred bee populations?
Think folks. It's your lives too that you are talking about.
But after you perform that trick, what happens when someone higher and more comfortably ensconced in the social order decides that you become the one who is expendable next?
When we realize that we will be forced to make the politically incorrect the topic of central discussion, what will it do to our own perceptions of ourselves?
When seeing millions die elsewhere as we expend little effort to prevent it, knowing that is almost certainly to result in a threat to our safety of our own families, what will this motivate us to do?
It makes a person question our own effectiveness of our own humanity, for what it is worth.
One can only be left wondering, is my and humanities number up given by my relative unwillingness to help work with others to solve the larger problem?
Do you really think that bird flu is going to stop at the border and tell the difference between you and Ruppert Murdoch? Some of the most recent cases have occurred in the upper Midwest and Northeast.
Don't you think we should try to help them so that as they try to be like us we all don't wind up killing each other one way or the other as we collectively stomp all over the few remaining bits of planetary ecosystem that sustains us all?
Slashdotters really better get their sh#!! together or all the best gamers and problem solvers will loose, big time.
Thin film crap or not, what the Chinese are doing is moving the world off fossil fuels sooner than it other wise would do so, if left to the wishes of the fossil fuels industry.
I would think paying for a few hundred Solyndra's would still be a bargain if we win the race in solar energy production. Loosing many costly rockets that were more expensive than what we lost in the Solyndra fiasco (remember the lost dollars still did stay and circulate in our economy) and a small price to pay that didn't prevent the US from ultimately winning the first leg of the space race. Why should we let a small setback like Solyndra stop us from getting out of the leadership game?
As a taxpayer and one who suffers daily from the pollution of fossil fuels, I say subsidize solar power heavily until the entire economy runs on solar power. Maybe in the process we can preserve what little of a manufacturing base we have left rather than handing China yet one more industry upon which the future will depend.
Actually, the control grid is a larger than you indicate. A reading of the interesting story on another/. thread concerning the global corporate network controlling most wealth is an interesting read. Corporations, banks,and perhaps a very few of the most highly placed bureaucrats, perhaps at institutions such as the World Bank, profit every step of the way, but they certainly aren't all American. Its not merely a US ruling elite rather its the new world corporate shadow government you don't get a vote in or for unless you own a humongous amount of stock and can afford to buy political influence and even entire legislatures at a time.
More power to the Chinese as they may be able to get the world of fossil fuels faster than the fossil fuels dominated governments of the West, whose primary mission seems only to be to cause human extinction within the next 200-300 years.
The argument is bogus because rare earths aren't all that rare and could be and were mined in the US and elsewhere when there was an incentive to do so. US corporate CEO's were more than happy to see the Chinese take over production and US production cease as long as it permitted the cost savings to be siphoned off in large part into their own pockets. The fact that the Chinese were smart enough to be happy to comply makes them the problem?
Our problem is that that whatever you think of the Chinese system, they at least have the sense to have a government and industries that actually set out long term plans, usually 5 years or more, to steer their economies toward improvement, whereas we have evolved a system that spends roughly 10% of its entire output trying to rig the political and governmental system to reward a few at the expense of the many. Perhaps, with so many Chinese their politicians can't afford such luxury.
Likewise the entire Solyndra controversy is bogus. We need a long term, 25 year plan to subsidize solar power. Even if there are a hundred Solyndra's along the way, in the end we may actually be able to keep pace with the Chinese and others who are determined to attain leadership in the economies of solar power production one way or the other. During the race to the moon, did the US stop trying when its first rockets proved costly disasters? Why should we be so eager to do so now?
When you consider that future of humanity almost certainly depends on someone succeeding in this effort to get the global economies off fossil fuels as fast as possible, perhaps we should be thanking the Chinese for their contribution rather than complaining about them. Regardless of what country you are from, the gold medal should be given to the one who runs the best and fastest race. It should not be granted because of corporate political corruption and cronyism, which is what is really killing the solar industry in the West. If the Chinese are wise enough to provide their runners with better running shoes, why can we not learn to do likewise?
Does anyone know if TSA has a prescreening or pre-clearing process, in which you can take an unusual device to them for inspection prior to baggage inspections so that they can inspect an unusual electronic device prior to the normal baggage screening process?
I am in the process of building a single plane structured range sensing device, meant to be portable so that I can take it to various museums world wide to measure biological materials. Because it will be relatively expensive to build and may confuse some TSA personnel, who might mistakenly think it is in someway harmful to anyone, it would be desirable to pre-clear it with TSA so that I don't wind up either without my device at my destination or my device rendered damaged or destroyed.
Any suggestions as to how to label it, document it, etc by anyone with a similar potential problem would be appreciated, especially those who may fly with medical or electronic devices of an unusual nature would be appreciated.
Pointless disucssion anyway, as the US, China, India, Russia whoever is going to face far greater challenges addressing the consequences of global warming than they will ever be able to come up with shooting dollars/wan/rupee/rubbles into outer space.
If folks think we are broke now, just wait until its starts getting hotter and we finally realize we have to do something about removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and oceans quick or good old planet earth will soon become as hospitable to life as say Venus.
"The money will be there, but the question is what will it buy?"
Perhaps the GOP corporate elite is hoping that it will be a Fourth Reich, as similar policies did for Germany in the 1930's. Fortunately, I own a wheelbarrow, which I will be able to act as a substitute for my wallet.
Nothing wrong with it. Its just that they should be contracting among themselves and not asking for the taxpayer to be providing the contracts, otherwise that would "socialism" and the last thing we need in Texas is GOP reps advancing socialism.
"Launch technology comes from the private sector."
This is pure BS. They only have this technology because we, the taxpayers, hired them to work in coordination with government scientists and the US military to create it. In no way can one regard "launch technology" or any part of the US space program solely a product of the private sector. In fact, without the government, the entire "private sector" of space-orieinted contracting would dry up and blow away. Only the Russians have been successful in selling seats on their rockets to put millionaires/billionaires in orbit, but even for them the average Russian helped subsidize the bill.
How so? There is far more money and benefit in understanding the fundamental science of human health than there ever has been in space travel. Space programs primarily benefit a few directly and a few more indirectly. Human health on the other hand affects everyone on a day to day basis. Thats why there is far more money in it.
As an academic, I see no dishonesty in any of the constrasts. You pass the list off as partisan, but do not in any way provide a single argument to demonstrate the list is in someway inaccurate. In fact, you merely suggest that you could provide another list, but then don't, which hardly bolsters the credibility of your charge.
Lets face it. Olson is doing what all politicians do, trying to have both sides of the issue. He's against deficits, except when such spending will benefit those in his district he feels he needs the support of. The problem for Olson and many other politicians is that the reality that their rhetoric has created has caught up with their rhetoric. Consequently, they are in a tough spot, but of course not nearly a tough a spot as their constitutents.
It doesn't really matter now. We can no longer afford a space program. Its just one of many things we won't be able to afford for some time to come. Thank goodness though the GOP has been able to better shield the top 5% from the ravages imposed on the rest of us. It is reassuring that at least the wealthiest among us won't have to suffer.
"it could mean a great tactical advantage in war."
This is so preposterous as to be absurd. In any potential conflict between the US and China, should thermonuclear weapons be used, the only real factor of any consequence is who might conceivably control what little of the world ecology that might still exist and support life after the exchange. The fact there may be a few moon bases that might lauch a "strategic" strike or that might last a few years without additional supplies from a planet earth that no longer exists would be meaningless in the extreme.
No, the victors will be the one's who manage to conserve what little of the natural ecology of the earth that is left to sustain their populations.
Without that, the prospect of humans surving long in space or on earth for that matter without earth generated support is virtually nill. Given the rate of human induced global warming, that window is likely to close for the vast majority of humanity within the next 100-200 years.
If you think its hot and dry in Texas this year, just wait till next year or the next decade. Folks will soon be longing for the "good old days" when it was only 120 degrees Farentheit in the shade.
The notion of privatizing space flight is practically a joke. The only impetus for it is government contracts which are given out to acheive it. Once these federal subsidizes are elminated for lack of budgetary authority, this whole "privatization" scheme will go belly up.
will soon be as dry as the moon. Why do they need to go anywhere for the same effect? Lets save some money and let them build plastic replicas of lunar landing craft in West Texas. Of course, given that the federal government is broke, the craft shouldn't have the luxury of air conditioners.
And this is one of the guys crying out to stop the spending right?
I suggest a compromise. Send GOP representatives into space, but give them only half the fuel they need to reach orbit as a money saving plan akin to the approach they provide for those on medicare and social security. To save costs "now that we are broke", they can have a voucher for the other half of the fuel.
Slashdot Mirror
Why do Americans generally tend to think that the problems in other parts of the world won't somehow find their way here, especially disease and famine. If global warming produces enough erratic weather it is not all inconceivable that one could get one or two consecutive growing too dry or too wet or possibly both Springs that essentially eliminate the growing seasons of most food crops, particularly now that vast infestations of numerous insect, fungal, and bacterial species from the tropics have largely eliminate most of the natural and human bred bee populations?
Think folks. It's your lives too that you are talking about.
But after you perform that trick, what happens when someone higher and more comfortably ensconced in the social order decides that you become the one who is expendable next?
When we realize that we will be forced to make the politically incorrect the topic of central discussion, what will it do to our own perceptions of ourselves?
When seeing millions die elsewhere as we expend little effort to prevent it, knowing that is almost certainly to result in a threat to our safety of our own families, what will this motivate us to do?
It makes a person question our own effectiveness of our own humanity, for what it is worth.
One can only be left wondering, is my and humanities number up given by my relative unwillingness to help work with others to solve the larger problem?
Do you really think that bird flu is going to stop at the border and tell the difference between you and Ruppert Murdoch? Some of the most recent cases have occurred in the upper Midwest and Northeast.
Don't you think we should try to help them so that as they try to be like us we all don't wind up killing each other one way or the other as we collectively stomp all over the few remaining bits of planetary ecosystem that sustains us all?
Slashdotters really better get their sh#!! together or all the best gamers and problem solvers will loose, big time.
Thin film crap or not, what the Chinese are doing is moving the world off fossil fuels sooner than it other wise would do so, if left to the wishes of the fossil fuels industry.
I would think paying for a few hundred Solyndra's would still be a bargain if we win the race in solar energy production. Loosing many costly rockets that were more expensive than what we lost in the Solyndra fiasco (remember the lost dollars still did stay and circulate in our economy) and a small price to pay that didn't prevent the US from ultimately winning the first leg of the space race. Why should we let a small setback like Solyndra stop us from getting out of the leadership game?
As a taxpayer and one who suffers daily from the pollution of fossil fuels, I say subsidize solar power heavily until the entire economy runs on solar power. Maybe in the process we can preserve what little of a manufacturing base we have left rather than handing China yet one more industry upon which the future will depend.
Actually, the control grid is a larger than you indicate. A reading of the interesting story on another /. thread concerning the global corporate network controlling most wealth is an interesting read. Corporations, banks,and perhaps a very few of the most highly placed bureaucrats, perhaps at institutions such as the World Bank, profit every step of the way, but they certainly aren't all American. Its not merely a US ruling elite rather its the new world corporate shadow government you don't get a vote in or for unless you own a humongous amount of stock and can afford to buy political influence and even entire legislatures at a time.
More power to the Chinese as they may be able to get the world of fossil fuels faster than the fossil fuels dominated governments of the West, whose primary mission seems only to be to cause human extinction within the next 200-300 years.
What ever happened to that American can-do attitude?
The argument is bogus because rare earths aren't all that rare and could be and were mined in the US and elsewhere when there was an incentive to do so. US corporate CEO's were more than happy to see the Chinese take over production and US production cease as long as it permitted the cost savings to be siphoned off in large part into their own pockets. The fact that the Chinese were smart enough to be happy to comply makes them the problem?
Our problem is that that whatever you think of the Chinese system, they at least have the sense to have a government and industries that actually set out long term plans, usually 5 years or more, to steer their economies toward improvement, whereas we have evolved a system that spends roughly 10% of its entire output trying to rig the political and governmental system to reward a few at the expense of the many. Perhaps, with so many Chinese their politicians can't afford such luxury.
Likewise the entire Solyndra controversy is bogus. We need a long term, 25 year plan to subsidize solar power. Even if there are a hundred Solyndra's along the way, in the end we may actually be able to keep pace with the Chinese and others who are determined to attain leadership in the economies of solar power production one way or the other. During the race to the moon, did the US stop trying when its first rockets proved costly disasters? Why should we be so eager to do so now?
When you consider that future of humanity almost certainly depends on someone succeeding in this effort to get the global economies off fossil fuels as fast as possible, perhaps we should be thanking the Chinese for their contribution rather than complaining about them. Regardless of what country you are from, the gold medal should be given to the one who runs the best and fastest race. It should not be granted because of corporate political corruption and cronyism, which is what is really killing the solar industry in the West. If the Chinese are wise enough to provide their runners with better running shoes, why can we not learn to do likewise?
Does anyone know if TSA has a prescreening or pre-clearing process, in which you can take an unusual device to them for inspection prior to baggage inspections so that they can inspect an unusual electronic device prior to the normal baggage screening process?
I am in the process of building a single plane structured range sensing device, meant to be portable so that I can take it to various museums world wide to measure biological materials. Because it will be relatively expensive to build and may confuse some TSA personnel, who might mistakenly think it is in someway harmful to anyone, it would be desirable to pre-clear it with TSA so that I don't wind up either without my device at my destination or my device rendered damaged or destroyed.
Any suggestions as to how to label it, document it, etc by anyone with a similar potential problem would be appreciated, especially those who may fly with medical or electronic devices of an unusual nature would be appreciated.
This is just another example of Texas GOP socialism.
Pointless disucssion anyway, as the US, China, India, Russia whoever is going to face far greater challenges addressing the consequences of global warming than they will ever be able to come up with shooting dollars/wan/rupee/rubbles into outer space.
If folks think we are broke now, just wait until its starts getting hotter and we finally realize we have to do something about removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and oceans quick or good old planet earth will soon become as hospitable to life as say Venus.
"The money will be there, but the question is what will it buy?"
Perhaps the GOP corporate elite is hoping that it will be a Fourth Reich, as similar policies did for Germany in the 1930's. Fortunately, I own a wheelbarrow, which I will be able to act as a substitute for my wallet.
Nothing wrong with it. Its just that they should be contracting among themselves and not asking for the taxpayer to be providing the contracts, otherwise that would "socialism" and the last thing we need in Texas is GOP reps advancing socialism.
"Launch technology comes from the private sector."
This is pure BS. They only have this technology because we, the taxpayers, hired them to work in coordination with government scientists and the US military to create it. In no way can one regard "launch technology" or any part of the US space program solely a product of the private sector. In fact, without the government, the entire "private sector" of space-orieinted contracting would dry up and blow away. Only the Russians have been successful in selling seats on their rockets to put millionaires/billionaires in orbit, but even for them the average Russian helped subsidize the bill.
"Health care just obviously lost."
How so? There is far more money and benefit in understanding the fundamental science of human health than there ever has been in space travel. Space programs primarily benefit a few directly and a few more indirectly. Human health on the other hand affects everyone on a day to day basis. Thats why there is far more money in it.
"Who is willing to govern with a sense of rationality?"
No one. That would be political suicide since the average voter doesn't use rationality to cast their vote.
As an academic, I see no dishonesty in any of the constrasts. You pass the list off as partisan, but do not in any way provide a single argument to demonstrate the list is in someway inaccurate. In fact, you merely suggest that you could provide another list, but then don't, which hardly bolsters the credibility of your charge.
Lets face it. Olson is doing what all politicians do, trying to have both sides of the issue. He's against deficits, except when such spending will benefit those in his district he feels he needs the support of. The problem for Olson and many other politicians is that the reality that their rhetoric has created has caught up with their rhetoric. Consequently, they are in a tough spot, but of course not nearly a tough a spot as their constitutents.
It doesn't really matter now. We can no longer afford a space program. Its just one of many things we won't be able to afford for some time to come. Thank goodness though the GOP has been able to better shield the top 5% from the ravages imposed on the rest of us. It is reassuring that at least the wealthiest among us won't have to suffer.
"it could mean a great tactical advantage in war."
This is so preposterous as to be absurd. In any potential conflict between the US and China, should thermonuclear weapons be used, the only real factor of any consequence is who might conceivably control what little of the world ecology that might still exist and support life after the exchange. The fact there may be a few moon bases that might lauch a "strategic" strike or that might last a few years without additional supplies from a planet earth that no longer exists would be meaningless in the extreme.
Yes, even though Constellation was forced upon them by Senator Shelby of Alabama.
No, the victors will be the one's who manage to conserve what little of the natural ecology of the earth that is left to sustain their populations.
Without that, the prospect of humans surving long in space or on earth for that matter without earth generated support is virtually nill. Given the rate of human induced global warming, that window is likely to close for the vast majority of humanity within the next 100-200 years.
If you think its hot and dry in Texas this year, just wait till next year or the next decade. Folks will soon be longing for the "good old days" when it was only 120 degrees Farentheit in the shade.
The notion of privatizing space flight is practically a joke. The only impetus for it is government contracts which are given out to acheive it. Once these federal subsidizes are elminated for lack of budgetary authority, this whole "privatization" scheme will go belly up.
will soon be as dry as the moon. Why do they need to go anywhere for the same effect? Lets save some money and let them build plastic replicas of lunar landing craft in West Texas. Of course, given that the federal government is broke, the craft shouldn't have the luxury of air conditioners.
And this is one of the guys crying out to stop the spending right?
I suggest a compromise. Send GOP representatives into space, but give them only half the fuel they need to reach orbit as a money saving plan akin to the approach they provide for those on medicare and social security. To save costs "now that we are broke", they can have a voucher for the other half of the fuel.