Wait, wait, are you saying that 2 wrongs don't make a right?! But what if the other person is a total _____, that changes it... right?
If you made out their paycheck to "fuck head" they would be happy. That is hostile enough that even if they somehow didn't have a lawsuit, they could quit and still get unemployment. There are few situations where that applies, but writing pejoratives on the paycheck would tend to make it easier to prove a hostile work environment.
People doing this are usually trying to get fired so that they can claim unemployment. That works, because they can claim that they didn't have to be fired, that they made a mistake and their behavior could be corrected simply by training them, writing them up and telling them not to do it. If they can get the company to want to fire them right away, it will generally be "without cause" because "with cause" can require the employer to prove not only that there was misconduct, but that it was bad enough to warrant firing. Often it isn't worth the trouble. If they didn't intentionally say the awful thing to the customer, they'll probably get fired without cause, and get their unemployment check. Or, they'll get written up and fired later after they get enough write-ups. Not getting fired is the fail, from the rogue employee perspective.
Quitting normally means you absolutely don't get unemployment, so there is no motivation for the lazy to quit instead of taking their chances on getting fired.
The users have no power over the workers, and the workers have real power over the users. The users receive real harm by many known, documented actions of comcast workers. Therefore, it is clear, without going into the details, that the users have very limited capability to do evil to the workers, and the workers have a disproportionately larger capability to do evil to the users.
Even if you convinced me that users are more evil by nature than the comcast workers, the comcast workers would still be the ones more likely to achieve evil acts. And since there are so many workers and users, and there is a history of attempted evil by both groups, it should be obvious that the comcast workers are achieving real evil, and the users are spewing hateful words and wishing they had capability to do evil.
You can look up the statistics of how many are busted for it.
I can, but you can't? If you could, why didn't you post to anything indicating that a private car service was illegal in NYC? Oh yeah, because they are 100% legal (so long as they aren't Uber). It's Uber being singled out, told to operate under inconsistent rules. Their response (right or wrong) is that they will operate under no rules, until forced to do so in court. Pretty much exactly the same as private cars in NYC. And private cars have existed for decades, and are going strong (and are 100% legal, under certain operating conditions).
Because I did look them up, but you're hand-waving. Also, "trust me the answer is ___" is a lame position. I don't expect people to get their facts and numbers from me, I expect people to verify information independently, or at least use a source they have some reason they trust. Feeding you the exact numbers doesn't improve your understanding, IMO.
You're saying they're "working strong," so are the drug dealers. Does that prove that the government isn't trying to fight the drug war, that crack cocaine is de-facto legal on account of the government hasn't stopped it? No? See, you would need to not only know that the illegal behavior continues, but also that nobody gets in trouble for it, to even claim to know that. If you didn't look up the numbers on your own before making the claim, it was a false claim. Even if you had accidentally guessed right and there is no enforcement (you didn't guess right, there is lots of enforcement, paid for by taxi medallion fees) you would still be wrong to claim to known without having checked.
Drug dealers have existed for "decades," and are "going strong." Fail.
We do know what to. He said, "I was late to meet my friends."
And it doesn't matter how important what he was late to was, unless you can prove some sort of gross negligence or that he was intentionally harmed.
It starts from, "Would a reasonable person believe that a [less-than-taxi] ride sharing service has guaranteed arrival time?" So even without considering the terms of service, we can already easily arrive at, no, a reasonable person would know that a ride service, even a real taxi, does not guarantee arrival times. And indeed, an arrival time is never even negotiated. So any harm that is caused by his being late rests on his own shoulders; cars sometimes get flat tires. It can be expected that a car has a chance to get a flat tire, even a hired car. It doesn't matter what the harm is unless you can prove that it is the fault of the driver or ride company.
You certainly never would have a person on the side of "there is no liability for that" having to brainstorm theories of harm. The person asserting liability has to do that. Be default there is no liability; some reason has to be provable.
A jury is going to be very upset at having their time wasted by somebody claiming that they didn't know part of hiring a car was that the car might get a flat tire, be stuck in traffic, or otherwise break down or be late. It is a known and obvious part of transportation by automobile. It is going to be difficult even to keep a straight face while claiming, "I never knew it was possible for a hired car to get a flat tire, and now that I know, I blame the driver. The driver certainly must have known that the car can get a flat tire, and negligently didn't maintain the tire properly." See how much fail there is there? To make it the drivers fault, it has to be both totally unknown to a reasonable consumer that there is a risk of flat tire, and also so well known to the driver that failure to prevent it is not only negligent, but grossly negligent. And in a ride-share, the driver is claimed to be an amateur just "sharing" a ride, not a professional taxi driver, so it rapidly gets more and more stupid. This is all long before you need to worry about what he was late for with his friends.
Compare that to rape. It is almost exactly the opposite; you'll have a hard time convincing a jury that being raped by a company representative is a normal risk that you would anticipate as part of the service. How do you even make the claim? "She should have known that being a woman and leaving the house, she might get raped." The jury isn't going to be in a good mood.
The defense for a taxi company is that the industry is regulated, the risk is regulated, and the local government decides on granting the driver a taxi license or not, and so the company has followed the system. It isn't their fault, primarily because the regulation establish the standard of how much checking they are supposed to do. So it is hard to make a free-form, "didn't do enough" type of argument. Without complying with that regulation, Uber doesn't have any of that protection. They can't hide behind the government. And if the plaintiff can show they made a minor mistake or oversight, or that they could have done better, or that some particular rapist would not have received a taxi license, well then they might win a giant lawsuit.
Absolute statements are not more-correct if you say them more casually.
Claiming "no risk" for something that is guaranteed to have risk, that shows a disregard for risk levels entirely independent of the character of the conversation.
And the character is not just "casual," but "casual debate of policy specifics" where the specific things people say is actually where any value is to be had in what they say.
Nothing you saw can stop Chernobyl from being something that happened, and the risk of it happening is part of the equation.
You blame politics, etc., well guess what: you don't get to choose the future politics of the world. That is the level of failure that exists, that is known.
That you want to write it off and have history somehow "not count" shows a deep disregard for reality; for the part of reality that has already happened, and that really should have better vision than just the covering of eyes.
all of the carbon was removed from the atmosphere by the plants, and will be released either through decomposition, or burning as fuel.
Doubtful. And by "released", that means "back into the environment".
That isn't "doubtful" at all. Doubtful would come up with a known unknown. This is a known known that you simply haven't learned. When the same amount of carbon is released either way, that is called called "carbon neutral." That is not something to doubt; it is not an unknown. CO2 is captured by the living plant, and unless the plant is building up new soil by being buried prior (and post) decomposition, then it will be released into the atmosphere.
For example "waste sugar" from a fruit processing plant. It would all be consumed by microbes, it isn't going to be stored away underground in a scheme to prevent decomposition. No, it is going to decompose in a giant pile, and whatever is left will be low carbon fertilizer source product.
By the way, electric cars do have fuel tanks, they're called "batteries."
Yep. And come back to me when the storage and distribution (refill) technology has gotten to the point where I can pretty much go anyplace, rather than having to carefully plan my route around quick-charge stations over overnight stays every 1-300 miles or rent a gasoline/diesel/e85 car..
In 15 years
This technology is PERPETUALLY "10-15 years away". Call me after it has ARRIVED and is actually pushing towards ubiquity.
*ring-a-ling* *ring-a-ling* This already came, but you're so busy hating on it you didn't see it walk in the door.http://www.pev4me.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/PlugShare-Charging-Sation-Map.png Even 5 years ago, there were only a few low population states like the Dakotas without public charging stations. The map is from 2012, and guess what? Investment has increased since then. The rate of growth has increased. The charging stations are everywhere, and in my city, about every 5th car is electric already.
You know you don't get out much when you're writing off something that has been widespread for years as something is perpetually 10-15 years away. 25 years ago when they told you it was 10-15 years away... it was!
I didn't say it will be here in 15 years. I said it is hear already and already popular; it is what is popular in a new car now. So in 15 years, these new cars will be the older cars on the road. That is what I was talking about in regards to "15 years." There was no waiting for technology claimed or implied.
The internet says they're not "tolerated," at all, except in the same sense that drug dealers are tolerated. They get arrested and fined regularly for breaking the rules, and yet, there are lots of people doing it and the enforcement hasn't stopped the behavior. But it isn't tolerated. You can look up the statistics of how many are busted for it.
Why would I need to be "hidebound" to rules? We have Direct Democracy. If the rule is so awful, you can get people that agree to sign petitions and the repeal will be on the ballot. Or you can write new rules, and get those on the ballot.
The existing rules are by consent of the community. They are not imposed rules, they are agreed rules. If you want to change them, come to us and ask to change them, don't just violate them and throw your nose up in the air and insist your rules are better.
We choose our rules, that isn't "hidebound" it is Freedom. You want to take that away from us, by imposing your opinions in place of the agreed system of regulation. Some places, mostly places without Direct Democracy, might cave to that. But don't expect it to standard. And expect those places to grow a backbone after they see those of us that are Free, exercising our right to local rules.
Who is whose advertising department? I read the book of Job, and it just isn't clear to me. So I read Isaiah, and I'm still not sure. Is one of the two main demons supposed to be a lesser evil?
Anyhow, regarding the NSA, whenever you're demonizing a group of people and just assuming that others must have a negative view of them, you're setting yourself up for disappointment. Nobody even bothers trying to make the case that some sin they committed is so bad that it is worse than the work they do (protecting from nuclear strike) is good. Nobody even tries. They just wave their hands, regurgitate some pejoratives, and assume everybody agrees. It doesn't occur to them that to an NSA worker, the exact opposite is equally obvious.
Your opinions about the world seem obvious because they're your own opinions, not because they are obviously true. Your friends will probably have the same opinions as you, or at least they'll yet you keep thinking they do. But that only reinforces the mistake, because people who disagree have friends who agree with them, too.
I don't know the details of how drivers in India are screened, and probably there isn't enough transparency to even try to know that. That said, it is impossible to have fully effective preventative measures. It doesn't exist, so it can't be put in place. Even if you put a military squad guarding each car, there would still be some non-zero rate of rapes.
What they can do is to do the same checks that taxis do, so that everybody knows they didn't do it wrong. That is the best they can do, is follow the system so if a rape happens depends on the community and the system of checks, not on which taxi or car service was used. It doesn't do any good to promise their system is just as good, either, because they're a private business and users don't have access to their offices, procedures, etc in order to know. Their duty is to make themselves not be a factor that contributes, or appears to contribute, to criminality, and the only possible way for them to give that reassurance to a community is by following regular taxi rules and having the drivers go through normal procedures in each jurisdiction. That is the only way to disconnect their behavior from the crimes, since they know going in that crimes will happen in vehicles while they are actively in use for their service.
If they are really fools, they'd benefit by picking up a text book and studying until they are no longer fools.
I've yet to see a textbook that successfully teaches intellectual curiosity, so I assume that even if you convinced them to spend years reading text books, they wouldn't retain anything beyond what they memorized temporarily to pass a test.
If they at least became engaged in civic process, then they might be exposed to the basics of which levers of power they can influence, and be taught some tactics for effective public debate and advocacy. As it is now the debate is so weak, it doesn't even require response from the Government.
Do you have permission from all mathematicians to speak for them? No? Then all of my statements stand. (of course)
Being a member of a group doesn't give you a special right to talk about them.
I never said I was defending you, and anybody who thinks I said that should really re-read what I said.
Gosh, that would be rather insulting and patronizing to think you needed defending. That would be just as patronizing as deciding on your behalf what your moral dilemmas should be.
Uber is doing background checks on drivers - at least as well as cab companies.
No. Nonono. "We're doing it just as well as the way we're supposed to, that's why we refuse to follow the rules." That just doesn't fly.
It is totally dishonest to both not be in compliance with the rules, and to claim to be in compliance with them because... "gosh our way is just as good."
Generally you have to have been harmed as least $20 to get into small claims court (varies by state, YMMV) so depending on surge pricing you may or may not be able to sue and attempt to prove your damages in court. Unfortunately for you, being late to meet your friends is unlikely to be something that can be made whole by money, so you're not going to be able to ask for more than the return of the fare. If you had been late to work and lost your job, you could conceivably sue for up to 6 months of wages. You'd lose, of course, because a reasonable person taking a cab or "rideshare that is just people sharing a ride not a real taxi" would know they might arrive late.
What you'd need would be a video of the driver later laughing at you for complaining about the flat tire, and sarcastically saying, "yeah, I got the flat on purpose." Then if he had an accent, and the sarcasm wasn't clear enough, you might even win.
If you don't know how "standing" works in law, how can you be in a position to argue that there is a problem with it in this case? It seems to me the farthest reasonable position in the direction you're going would be, "golly gee, I have no idea how that stuff works, I wonder if her lawyer got legal advice first?"
Right, directly responsible gets you charged with "rape" and placed in jail, indirectly responsible gets you a lawsuit. Nobody is claiming it is the same.
If they refuse to play by the same rules, then they have a hard time claiming their process is even better than the legal process they're supposed to use, without actually doing an almost perfect job.
Once they start following the same rules and checks as taxis, then if there is a problem all we have to ask is, "are they any worse than taxis?"
When it is a group that is in ongoing violation of the regulations, I just don't see why they qualify for the protection offered by having complied with the process. After all, that is the taxi company's excuse; background checks are regulated, and they did the checks that are supposed to work.
Now, ARE biofuels truly carbon neutral or carbon negative? No.
Wrong. They're carbon neutral, because of the way decomposition works. Only certain types of ecosystems store large amounts of carbon. In biofuels, all of the carbon was removed from the atmosphere by the plants, and will be released either through decomposition, or burning as fuel.
Some people assume that it takes a bunch of gasoline to make biofuel, because they don't realize that you can also use the biofuel to run the factory and transportation equipment.
It is true though that E85 is only 85% carbon neutral. If that is what you meant by "truly" then I admit the non biofuel part of the mix is not carbon neutral, and it still does have that 15%.
However the B99 biodiesel is 99.999%
The anti-biofuel propaganda is funny. For example the WSJ did a story claiming biofuels aren't carbon neutral... because they think you have to clear forests in order to get plant waste! lol
In my state biofuels are big business right now. Most of the restaurant grease is being used. The processed fruit factories have largely gone to selling the "waste" for fuel production. Test factories are converting landscape waste, and corn stalks. We don't have surplus corn production here, so no food corn is diverted to fuel. It is also mostly unsubsidized in this region. I can hardly go a block without a new subaru with a "flex fuel" logo. The only time I see a string of cars without at least one flex fuel logo is when it is all electric hybrids. They're doing trial runs of using kitchen food waste, too. In restaurants to start, but with the plan of having the residential garbage haulers pick up food waste.
By the way, electric cars do have fuel tanks, they're called "batteries." The majority of new cars I see are either electric hybrids, or flex fuel. That is true of all categories, too; SUVs, cars, trucks, whatever. In 15 years most vehicles will either be electric or flex fuel. The old cars will be hybrids.
There is no escaping the fact that flex fuel and electric are both here to stay. Gasoline will be around for a long time too, but most of the cars that run it will be "flex fuel" cars that can also run E85. Real progress is happening, on multiple fronts. There is no silver bullet, and the time when people were waiting around for the perfect solution already passed. The future is here now, and vehicle emissions are starting a downwards trend. Unfortunately, cars are a small part of the carbon problem.
much less establish a track record of nuclear safety.
Do you realize that nuclear power - with everything that people have done wrong with it - is by far the safest method of producing energy (clean, dirty, or otherwise) that mankind has ever developed?
I certainly concede that is a talking point of one side, but every time the people involved talk about it, they oversell it substantially. I don't think the case has actually been made that it is true. I think instead it is simply asserted to be true, and anybody who disagrees is shouted down as anti-science, or a "hippie."
Even your own statement, it is very strongly worded including a bunch of absolutes that ensure that the claims are not literally true, as stated. It is rather trivial to name safer energy sources. You need a whole pile of caveats to make it true, and if you state it with those required elements, then it will no longer just be some triumphant sort of, "we're right, we're 110% right, 120% right, we're the most right of anybody ever," etc.
You even find it necessary to disown real disasters, to suggest that Chernobyl doesn't count, somehow.
The reality is that you have to support those claims. You're saying it is super-safe, I'm saying that is contested and unclear. It is known to be a contested point. That it is not agreed on scientifically is a known known. You want to prove that it is not in dispute, that it is some sort of agreed fact that it is "safe," it is up to you to go into the weeds and prove that.
And the reality is that you'll end up making a bunch of value judgements about non-energy-related perils in the world, and balance them all, and assign blame, and apply geopolitical theories about resource access, before you can even make a claim for one position or the other. And you'll be sitting on a giant pile of contested points.
It is not going to become uncontested merely by handwaving or body language.
Suggesting somebody might be "off their rocker" somewhat precludes your complaint about a lack of politeness. It certain makes it unlikely that the person address thusly will be concerned.
As for the semantics, they are as written and it shouldn't be ambiguous. If you don't understand it, or it doesn't make sense to you, that is fine. As with other things that you don't understand, you can parse it until you find a way of doing so where it makes sense, in which case you probably understood the intended meaning. Or you can just call it names and move on.
You offered a substantial insult to a set of people, "mathematicians in the direct employ of NSA" who are probably very intelligent people who have no doubt already thought about the implications of their work. They are certainly more capable of such analysis than pundits. You seem to be completely unaware how patronizing and presumptuous your analysis was, even while getting particularly sensitive of your own feelings simply from somebody defending the ability of mathematicians to exercise free will successfully.
Government funding of things is everybody's business. People's moral codes are personal. And [worked with a group whose civics and/or politics I am opposed to] does not in any way imply they have a moral deficiency. Any more than you disliking a group approved of by mathematicians would mean they should question your morality.
The words "won't crack open the cases" implies zero risk. "Won't." In the context of unknown future disasters, even. It shows a complete disregard for probability, and for safety analysis based on facts.
How would you get it there without risk? There will be great risk in moving it. It is not obvious that the risk is less, even if the final storage is perfect.
It is obvious that for many of the people on the transportation route the risk will vastly go up, especially for people who have chosen collectively not to have any nuclear plants in their region. I've yet to hear of any transportation plan other than, "too bad."
With on-site storage, at least the risk is distributed according to an area having already accepted that exact risk.
The closest you can come to no risk is a nuclear industry press release, or a magic pony.
Slashdot Mirror
Wait, wait, are you saying that 2 wrongs don't make a right?! But what if the other person is a total _____, that changes it... right?
If you made out their paycheck to "fuck head" they would be happy. That is hostile enough that even if they somehow didn't have a lawsuit, they could quit and still get unemployment. There are few situations where that applies, but writing pejoratives on the paycheck would tend to make it easier to prove a hostile work environment.
People doing this are usually trying to get fired so that they can claim unemployment. That works, because they can claim that they didn't have to be fired, that they made a mistake and their behavior could be corrected simply by training them, writing them up and telling them not to do it. If they can get the company to want to fire them right away, it will generally be "without cause" because "with cause" can require the employer to prove not only that there was misconduct, but that it was bad enough to warrant firing. Often it isn't worth the trouble. If they didn't intentionally say the awful thing to the customer, they'll probably get fired without cause, and get their unemployment check. Or, they'll get written up and fired later after they get enough write-ups. Not getting fired is the fail, from the rogue employee perspective.
Quitting normally means you absolutely don't get unemployment, so there is no motivation for the lazy to quit instead of taking their chances on getting fired.
The users have no power over the workers, and the workers have real power over the users. The users receive real harm by many known, documented actions of comcast workers. Therefore, it is clear, without going into the details, that the users have very limited capability to do evil to the workers, and the workers have a disproportionately larger capability to do evil to the users.
Even if you convinced me that users are more evil by nature than the comcast workers, the comcast workers would still be the ones more likely to achieve evil acts. And since there are so many workers and users, and there is a history of attempted evil by both groups, it should be obvious that the comcast workers are achieving real evil, and the users are spewing hateful words and wishing they had capability to do evil.
You can look up the statistics of how many are busted for it.
I can, but you can't? If you could, why didn't you post to anything indicating that a private car service was illegal in NYC? Oh yeah, because they are 100% legal (so long as they aren't Uber). It's Uber being singled out, told to operate under inconsistent rules. Their response (right or wrong) is that they will operate under no rules, until forced to do so in court. Pretty much exactly the same as private cars in NYC. And private cars have existed for decades, and are going strong (and are 100% legal, under certain operating conditions).
Because I did look them up, but you're hand-waving. Also, "trust me the answer is ___" is a lame position. I don't expect people to get their facts and numbers from me, I expect people to verify information independently, or at least use a source they have some reason they trust. Feeding you the exact numbers doesn't improve your understanding, IMO.
You're saying they're "working strong," so are the drug dealers. Does that prove that the government isn't trying to fight the drug war, that crack cocaine is de-facto legal on account of the government hasn't stopped it? No? See, you would need to not only know that the illegal behavior continues, but also that nobody gets in trouble for it, to even claim to know that. If you didn't look up the numbers on your own before making the claim, it was a false claim. Even if you had accidentally guessed right and there is no enforcement (you didn't guess right, there is lots of enforcement, paid for by taxi medallion fees) you would still be wrong to claim to known without having checked.
Drug dealers have existed for "decades," and are "going strong." Fail.
We do know what to. He said, "I was late to meet my friends."
And it doesn't matter how important what he was late to was, unless you can prove some sort of gross negligence or that he was intentionally harmed.
It starts from, "Would a reasonable person believe that a [less-than-taxi] ride sharing service has guaranteed arrival time?" So even without considering the terms of service, we can already easily arrive at, no, a reasonable person would know that a ride service, even a real taxi, does not guarantee arrival times. And indeed, an arrival time is never even negotiated. So any harm that is caused by his being late rests on his own shoulders; cars sometimes get flat tires. It can be expected that a car has a chance to get a flat tire, even a hired car. It doesn't matter what the harm is unless you can prove that it is the fault of the driver or ride company.
You certainly never would have a person on the side of "there is no liability for that" having to brainstorm theories of harm. The person asserting liability has to do that. Be default there is no liability; some reason has to be provable.
A jury is going to be very upset at having their time wasted by somebody claiming that they didn't know part of hiring a car was that the car might get a flat tire, be stuck in traffic, or otherwise break down or be late. It is a known and obvious part of transportation by automobile. It is going to be difficult even to keep a straight face while claiming, "I never knew it was possible for a hired car to get a flat tire, and now that I know, I blame the driver. The driver certainly must have known that the car can get a flat tire, and negligently didn't maintain the tire properly." See how much fail there is there? To make it the drivers fault, it has to be both totally unknown to a reasonable consumer that there is a risk of flat tire, and also so well known to the driver that failure to prevent it is not only negligent, but grossly negligent. And in a ride-share, the driver is claimed to be an amateur just "sharing" a ride, not a professional taxi driver, so it rapidly gets more and more stupid. This is all long before you need to worry about what he was late for with his friends.
Compare that to rape. It is almost exactly the opposite; you'll have a hard time convincing a jury that being raped by a company representative is a normal risk that you would anticipate as part of the service. How do you even make the claim? "She should have known that being a woman and leaving the house, she might get raped." The jury isn't going to be in a good mood.
The defense for a taxi company is that the industry is regulated, the risk is regulated, and the local government decides on granting the driver a taxi license or not, and so the company has followed the system. It isn't their fault, primarily because the regulation establish the standard of how much checking they are supposed to do. So it is hard to make a free-form, "didn't do enough" type of argument. Without complying with that regulation, Uber doesn't have any of that protection. They can't hide behind the government. And if the plaintiff can show they made a minor mistake or oversight, or that they could have done better, or that some particular rapist would not have received a taxi license, well then they might win a giant lawsuit.
Absolute statements are not more-correct if you say them more casually.
Claiming "no risk" for something that is guaranteed to have risk, that shows a disregard for risk levels entirely independent of the character of the conversation.
And the character is not just "casual," but "casual debate of policy specifics" where the specific things people say is actually where any value is to be had in what they say.
Nothing you saw can stop Chernobyl from being something that happened, and the risk of it happening is part of the equation.
You blame politics, etc., well guess what: you don't get to choose the future politics of the world. That is the level of failure that exists, that is known.
That you want to write it off and have history somehow "not count" shows a deep disregard for reality; for the part of reality that has already happened, and that really should have better vision than just the covering of eyes.
all of the carbon was removed from the atmosphere by the plants, and will be released either through decomposition, or burning as fuel.
Doubtful. And by "released", that means "back into the environment".
That isn't "doubtful" at all. Doubtful would come up with a known unknown. This is a known known that you simply haven't learned. When the same amount of carbon is released either way, that is called called "carbon neutral." That is not something to doubt; it is not an unknown. CO2 is captured by the living plant, and unless the plant is building up new soil by being buried prior (and post) decomposition, then it will be released into the atmosphere.
For example "waste sugar" from a fruit processing plant. It would all be consumed by microbes, it isn't going to be stored away underground in a scheme to prevent decomposition. No, it is going to decompose in a giant pile, and whatever is left will be low carbon fertilizer source product.
By the way, electric cars do have fuel tanks, they're called "batteries."
Yep. And come back to me when the storage and distribution (refill) technology has gotten to the point where I can pretty much go anyplace, rather than having to carefully plan my route around quick-charge stations over overnight stays every 1-300 miles or rent a gasoline/diesel/e85 car..
In 15 years
This technology is PERPETUALLY "10-15 years away". Call me after it has ARRIVED and is actually pushing towards ubiquity.
*ring-a-ling* *ring-a-ling* This already came, but you're so busy hating on it you didn't see it walk in the door.http://www.pev4me.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/PlugShare-Charging-Sation-Map.png Even 5 years ago, there were only a few low population states like the Dakotas without public charging stations. The map is from 2012, and guess what? Investment has increased since then. The rate of growth has increased. The charging stations are everywhere, and in my city, about every 5th car is electric already.
You know you don't get out much when you're writing off something that has been widespread for years as something is perpetually 10-15 years away. 25 years ago when they told you it was 10-15 years away... it was!
I didn't say it will be here in 15 years. I said it is hear already and already popular; it is what is popular in a new car now. So in 15 years, these new cars will be the older cars on the road. That is what I was talking about in regards to "15 years." There was no waiting for technology claimed or implied.
The internet says they're not "tolerated," at all, except in the same sense that drug dealers are tolerated. They get arrested and fined regularly for breaking the rules, and yet, there are lots of people doing it and the enforcement hasn't stopped the behavior. But it isn't tolerated. You can look up the statistics of how many are busted for it.
Why would I need to be "hidebound" to rules? We have Direct Democracy. If the rule is so awful, you can get people that agree to sign petitions and the repeal will be on the ballot. Or you can write new rules, and get those on the ballot.
The existing rules are by consent of the community. They are not imposed rules, they are agreed rules. If you want to change them, come to us and ask to change them, don't just violate them and throw your nose up in the air and insist your rules are better.
We choose our rules, that isn't "hidebound" it is Freedom. You want to take that away from us, by imposing your opinions in place of the agreed system of regulation. Some places, mostly places without Direct Democracy, might cave to that. But don't expect it to standard. And expect those places to grow a backbone after they see those of us that are Free, exercising our right to local rules.
You waved your hands, but you didn't propose a theory of how he was harmed.
Who is whose advertising department? I read the book of Job, and it just isn't clear to me. So I read Isaiah, and I'm still not sure. Is one of the two main demons supposed to be a lesser evil?
Anyhow, regarding the NSA, whenever you're demonizing a group of people and just assuming that others must have a negative view of them, you're setting yourself up for disappointment. Nobody even bothers trying to make the case that some sin they committed is so bad that it is worse than the work they do (protecting from nuclear strike) is good. Nobody even tries. They just wave their hands, regurgitate some pejoratives, and assume everybody agrees. It doesn't occur to them that to an NSA worker, the exact opposite is equally obvious.
Your opinions about the world seem obvious because they're your own opinions, not because they are obviously true. Your friends will probably have the same opinions as you, or at least they'll yet you keep thinking they do. But that only reinforces the mistake, because people who disagree have friends who agree with them, too.
I don't know the details of how drivers in India are screened, and probably there isn't enough transparency to even try to know that. That said, it is impossible to have fully effective preventative measures. It doesn't exist, so it can't be put in place. Even if you put a military squad guarding each car, there would still be some non-zero rate of rapes.
What they can do is to do the same checks that taxis do, so that everybody knows they didn't do it wrong. That is the best they can do, is follow the system so if a rape happens depends on the community and the system of checks, not on which taxi or car service was used. It doesn't do any good to promise their system is just as good, either, because they're a private business and users don't have access to their offices, procedures, etc in order to know. Their duty is to make themselves not be a factor that contributes, or appears to contribute, to criminality, and the only possible way for them to give that reassurance to a community is by following regular taxi rules and having the drivers go through normal procedures in each jurisdiction. That is the only way to disconnect their behavior from the crimes, since they know going in that crimes will happen in vehicles while they are actively in use for their service.
If they are really fools, they'd benefit by picking up a text book and studying until they are no longer fools.
I've yet to see a textbook that successfully teaches intellectual curiosity, so I assume that even if you convinced them to spend years reading text books, they wouldn't retain anything beyond what they memorized temporarily to pass a test.
If they at least became engaged in civic process, then they might be exposed to the basics of which levers of power they can influence, and be taught some tactics for effective public debate and advocacy. As it is now the debate is so weak, it doesn't even require response from the Government.
I didn't defend you, so go away.
Do you have permission from all mathematicians to speak for them? No? Then all of my statements stand. (of course)
Being a member of a group doesn't give you a special right to talk about them.
I never said I was defending you, and anybody who thinks I said that should really re-read what I said.
Gosh, that would be rather insulting and patronizing to think you needed defending. That would be just as patronizing as deciding on your behalf what your moral dilemmas should be.
If they refuse to play by the same rules,
Uber is doing background checks on drivers - at least as well as cab companies.
No. Nonono. "We're doing it just as well as the way we're supposed to, that's why we refuse to follow the rules." That just doesn't fly.
It is totally dishonest to both not be in compliance with the rules, and to claim to be in compliance with them because... "gosh our way is just as good."
Generally you have to have been harmed as least $20 to get into small claims court (varies by state, YMMV) so depending on surge pricing you may or may not be able to sue and attempt to prove your damages in court. Unfortunately for you, being late to meet your friends is unlikely to be something that can be made whole by money, so you're not going to be able to ask for more than the return of the fare. If you had been late to work and lost your job, you could conceivably sue for up to 6 months of wages. You'd lose, of course, because a reasonable person taking a cab or "rideshare that is just people sharing a ride not a real taxi" would know they might arrive late.
What you'd need would be a video of the driver later laughing at you for complaining about the flat tire, and sarcastically saying, "yeah, I got the flat on purpose." Then if he had an accent, and the sarcasm wasn't clear enough, you might even win.
If you don't know how "standing" works in law, how can you be in a position to argue that there is a problem with it in this case? It seems to me the farthest reasonable position in the direction you're going would be, "golly gee, I have no idea how that stuff works, I wonder if her lawyer got legal advice first?"
Right, directly responsible gets you charged with "rape" and placed in jail, indirectly responsible gets you a lawsuit. Nobody is claiming it is the same.
If they refuse to play by the same rules, then they have a hard time claiming their process is even better than the legal process they're supposed to use, without actually doing an almost perfect job.
Once they start following the same rules and checks as taxis, then if there is a problem all we have to ask is, "are they any worse than taxis?"
When it is a group that is in ongoing violation of the regulations, I just don't see why they qualify for the protection offered by having complied with the process. After all, that is the taxi company's excuse; background checks are regulated, and they did the checks that are supposed to work.
They brag about their super-awesome insurance, one real thing this case will do is test that.
If the insurance is so great, they'll pay her claim without going to trial.
If they fight it, or the insurance won't cover it, then they can shut up about that one.
Now, ARE biofuels truly carbon neutral or carbon negative? No.
Wrong. They're carbon neutral, because of the way decomposition works. Only certain types of ecosystems store large amounts of carbon. In biofuels, all of the carbon was removed from the atmosphere by the plants, and will be released either through decomposition, or burning as fuel.
Some people assume that it takes a bunch of gasoline to make biofuel, because they don't realize that you can also use the biofuel to run the factory and transportation equipment.
It is true though that E85 is only 85% carbon neutral. If that is what you meant by "truly" then I admit the non biofuel part of the mix is not carbon neutral, and it still does have that 15%.
However the B99 biodiesel is 99.999%
The anti-biofuel propaganda is funny. For example the WSJ did a story claiming biofuels aren't carbon neutral... because they think you have to clear forests in order to get plant waste! lol
In my state biofuels are big business right now. Most of the restaurant grease is being used. The processed fruit factories have largely gone to selling the "waste" for fuel production. Test factories are converting landscape waste, and corn stalks. We don't have surplus corn production here, so no food corn is diverted to fuel. It is also mostly unsubsidized in this region. I can hardly go a block without a new subaru with a "flex fuel" logo. The only time I see a string of cars without at least one flex fuel logo is when it is all electric hybrids. They're doing trial runs of using kitchen food waste, too. In restaurants to start, but with the plan of having the residential garbage haulers pick up food waste.
By the way, electric cars do have fuel tanks, they're called "batteries." The majority of new cars I see are either electric hybrids, or flex fuel. That is true of all categories, too; SUVs, cars, trucks, whatever. In 15 years most vehicles will either be electric or flex fuel. The old cars will be hybrids.
There is no escaping the fact that flex fuel and electric are both here to stay. Gasoline will be around for a long time too, but most of the cars that run it will be "flex fuel" cars that can also run E85. Real progress is happening, on multiple fronts. There is no silver bullet, and the time when people were waiting around for the perfect solution already passed. The future is here now, and vehicle emissions are starting a downwards trend. Unfortunately, cars are a small part of the carbon problem.
much less establish a track record of nuclear safety.
Do you realize that nuclear power - with everything that people have done wrong with it - is by far the safest method of producing energy (clean, dirty, or otherwise) that mankind has ever developed?
I certainly concede that is a talking point of one side, but every time the people involved talk about it, they oversell it substantially. I don't think the case has actually been made that it is true. I think instead it is simply asserted to be true, and anybody who disagrees is shouted down as anti-science, or a "hippie."
Even your own statement, it is very strongly worded including a bunch of absolutes that ensure that the claims are not literally true, as stated. It is rather trivial to name safer energy sources. You need a whole pile of caveats to make it true, and if you state it with those required elements, then it will no longer just be some triumphant sort of, "we're right, we're 110% right, 120% right, we're the most right of anybody ever," etc.
You even find it necessary to disown real disasters, to suggest that Chernobyl doesn't count, somehow.
The reality is that you have to support those claims. You're saying it is super-safe, I'm saying that is contested and unclear. It is known to be a contested point. That it is not agreed on scientifically is a known known. You want to prove that it is not in dispute, that it is some sort of agreed fact that it is "safe," it is up to you to go into the weeds and prove that.
And the reality is that you'll end up making a bunch of value judgements about non-energy-related perils in the world, and balance them all, and assign blame, and apply geopolitical theories about resource access, before you can even make a claim for one position or the other. And you'll be sitting on a giant pile of contested points.
It is not going to become uncontested merely by handwaving or body language.
Suggesting somebody might be "off their rocker" somewhat precludes your complaint about a lack of politeness. It certain makes it unlikely that the person address thusly will be concerned.
As for the semantics, they are as written and it shouldn't be ambiguous. If you don't understand it, or it doesn't make sense to you, that is fine. As with other things that you don't understand, you can parse it until you find a way of doing so where it makes sense, in which case you probably understood the intended meaning. Or you can just call it names and move on.
You offered a substantial insult to a set of people, "mathematicians in the direct employ of NSA" who are probably very intelligent people who have no doubt already thought about the implications of their work. They are certainly more capable of such analysis than pundits. You seem to be completely unaware how patronizing and presumptuous your analysis was, even while getting particularly sensitive of your own feelings simply from somebody defending the ability of mathematicians to exercise free will successfully.
Government funding of things is everybody's business. People's moral codes are personal. And [worked with a group whose civics and/or politics I am opposed to] does not in any way imply they have a moral deficiency. Any more than you disliking a group approved of by mathematicians would mean they should question your morality.
The words "won't crack open the cases" implies zero risk. "Won't." In the context of unknown future disasters, even. It shows a complete disregard for probability, and for safety analysis based on facts.
How would you get it there without risk? There will be great risk in moving it. It is not obvious that the risk is less, even if the final storage is perfect.
It is obvious that for many of the people on the transportation route the risk will vastly go up, especially for people who have chosen collectively not to have any nuclear plants in their region. I've yet to hear of any transportation plan other than, "too bad."
With on-site storage, at least the risk is distributed according to an area having already accepted that exact risk.
The closest you can come to no risk is a nuclear industry press release, or a magic pony.