The common shortcuts are too valuable to give up. Ctrl-C, Ctrl-V, Ctrl-X, Alt-F, etc. are all in the wrong place on the keyboard when you switch to Dvorak. I tried to learn it for a little while, but I quickly gave up after running into this real-world problem.
Yeah, I suppose I could've gone through and re-mapped those shortcuts, but that would've been a pain in the butt doing at every computer I ever sit down at, for every application.
Actually, I pretty much don't think I need the health insurance if I'm working. Naturally, if I weren't working there, and thus contributing to the GDP, they wouldn't be interested in offering me national health insurance, however I wouldn't be able to just bum around in Germany for sure.
Well, if you want to see at least one more bright-minded foreigner, then you could always offer me a job/marriage.;) lol
You cannot live as freely as you do in the US if you live in any of the Euro-Nazi countries. That's how most of the non-whites feel anyway. Racism is a big factor out there.
Not saying the US is completely devoid of it, but it's nothing that hinders your normal life here.
Not saying this is a particularly good thing, however, I'm an attractive white female (1/4 hispanic, but since it's white hispanic, no one notices... I just look well tanned)
I didn't choose Germany just willy nilly, actually, I already speak the language, know a lot of the culture, and already spent a month living there before.
One more time the bigotry triumphs. Leader of the world, biggest and strongest army... locked away in his castle on the hilltop shooting at the mailman scared for his life. Congrats America, if that's what your freedom looks like... no wonder "they" hate it. I do too. The USA used to be a symbol for immgration, diversity and -hell- freedom. Now it's become a symbol of lies, deception, bigotry, intolerance and paranoia. It makes me sad actually.
I'm kind of sad to be "stuck" in the United States. People point out that I'm able to immigrate to another country, but the truth it, is that immigration is tough. The country I would go to would be Germany, but I only get to live and work there for 3 months before I have to get full permission to stay indefinitely.
If the EU granted US citizens the right to immigrate freely, like they can within the EU, I would be there in a heartbeat.
I just get so disgusted at the xenophobia here in the US... seriously, do we HAVE to be this scared of "furriners"?
The hassles of coming into the US even as an American citizen have been plainly apparent to me every time I have traveled out of the country.
To Mexico? 25Â, bienvenido! From Mexico? "Excuse me, ma'am, do you have your id? Can you prove you're a US citizen? Are you totally shit-faced drunk? Hold up there, your friend looks Mexican, we need to check him more thoroughly."
To Germany/Belgium: Hi there ma'am, passport? What are you here for? Awesome, enjoy our country. If you have anything to report, go to the red door, or more likely, just go walk through the green door, because no one is going to check you anyways. This is the entirety of our customs inspection. Just know that if we do randomly check you, and you were supposed to report something, you'll be fined. From Germany/Belgium: Please fill out this form stating what you're bringing back to the US, or if you're a US citizen living abroad, what will be staying here after you leave. OMG, you have German-language versions of US film?! ARE YOU A TERRORIST?! WHY DON'T YOU WANT TO SPEAK ENGLISH?! Passport? Sorry, we have to hassle you more than you were hassled even in the foreign country, even though you're actually a citizen here, ok, not really sorry. Please obtain your luggage, go through customs. Oh, and even if you only reported bringing in anything that you have to legally declare, we're still going to check. Have you been on a farm? We want to make sure you didn't bring any farm animal fecal matter back... yeah, we can't trust that you washed the shit off your shoes before packing it into your suit-case. Ok, give your luggage back to your airline, you can go into the US now. Welcome, you probably missed your connecting flight, sorry.... ok, you're right, not really. We're sorry though, that we're not sorry about any of the hassles... oh wait, no we're not.
So far, what I've heard of visiting Canada:
To Canada: Hi Ma'am, welcome to Canada, eh. From Canada: Can we see your passport? Are you a terrorist? May we check your car for illegal stuff? Why do you insist on this "search and seizure" stuff? OMG, you actually know US rights, you _HAVE_ to be a terrorist, because REAL US citizens are too ambivalent to know...
Just like Brazil is not listening. They have starving people who need room to grow food. And they also see the chance to be as prosperous as the U.S. by "taming" the wilderness. Dying people + wealth is a powerful combination which disfavors tree preservation.
I will agree to the discord in us telling them not to clearcut. However, recall, I'm suggesting offering them more lucrative ways to be as prosperous as the US without "taming" the wilderness.
Really, if we want them to listen to "don't make the same mistakes we did" then we had best offer alternatives, rather than simply the typical fundie statement "ZOMG DON'T DO IT!" I much prefer the rationalist statement "Ok, if you're going to do this, then here are the consequences... or, you could do this, and be happy _and_ avoid those consequences."
But you haven't provided any evidence of that. One does not necessarily follow from the other.
I thought this was clear... in order to make more paper, we have to make more of the renewable resource that is used in its production... namely, trees.
This is the same reason why more popcorn == more corn, and more french fries == more potatoes.
This "open air" "land fill" that I was referring to was the Mesa... namely, the desert. People liter, it's a fact.
As for biological degradation, see Nylonase... if there is a source of nutrition available to a species, then if something mutates to be able to eat it, and nothing else is eating it, BOOM! population explosion.
I'm sorry, but I find this fear based approach to environmentalism to be just as hilarious as fundie christian ignorance. Landfills do not always pollute water tables. The idea that a child sheds polio virus into their feces once they've had the vaccine is equally stupid, because they are given an INACTIVE strain of polio virus... that means it cannot replicate. At the same time, the issue of dysentery: "Dysentery is typically the result of unsanitary water containing micro-organisms which damage the intestinal lining." Now, I'd like to ask you, where are you getting your tap water, that hasn't been filtered?
The EPA has strict controls on tap water quality that include particles smaller than micro-organisms. Between the time of treatment to be potable water, and your house are pipes. If there were actually a risk at all of microorganisms being in your tap water, the government would issue a warning to boil all water before you use it for potable purposes.
It's all just the same scare tactics, except instead of "ZOMG YOU'LL GO TO HELL IF YOU DON'T DO THIS!" it's "ZOMG DISEASE WILL GET YOU IF YOU DON'T DO THIS!" I can't help but draw a parallel between your fanaticism and arguments and the bullshit that is fundie religionism... that's not saying that you're WRONG, but rather saying that you should work harder to present an argument other than an appeal to fear/consequences.
Still... when you talk about a paperless society people talking about "saving the trees", not about "saving the energy required to make paper and ship bills".
Because ultimately it does have that effect. Paperless billing alone won't make the difference, but if society lowers consumption of wood-based products enough, then you start to need less logging activity. Less logging activity means more old-growth forest and biodiversity. You seem to be acting as if all trees are the same. They aren't. A plantation of commercial trees is not the same as a natural forest.
But yes, the immediate impact of paperless bills would be on energy consumption, because of the high rate of recycled material that goes into the the paper that bills are typically printed on.
But you'll agree that lumber uses far more wood than paper. One could take a single 2x4 from a house and likely make about a ream of paper from it.
In either case, the argument of biodiversity is entirely separate from "save the trees", because as stated... "more paper == more trees". If you want to increase CO_2 absorption of the planet, then any tree/plant will really do. True, some will work better than others, but at that point old growth and new growth forests are more or less equivalent.
So the environmental impact of cloth and disposable diapers is roughly the same unless you live in an area where water or landfill spaces is in short supply.
In New Mexico, where my parents live, water is in short supply, and landfill space is in large supply.
So, at least in New Mexico, it's generally better to use disposables. As for the 500 year break down argument, oddly enough, an orange peel thrown on the ground will take longer to deteriorate than any of aluminum, plastic or paper. This is because the three later ones deteriorate well from environmental factors. (Specifically plastics. Plastics break down from exposure to light, which is abundant in New Mexico.) While the orange peel requires organisms that thrive in a moist environment.
This isn't really just anecdote either, seriously, you'll be walking around the Mesa, and there are orange peels all over, as well as cans and plastic objects. If you kick them, the orange peels are fully solid and don't break apart, although the cans and plastics will just obliterate.
Well, in my case, I don't hate Windows because of crashes. I've used it a lot in the past, and had for awhile at a previous job.
That previous job was actually at Microsoft, which allowed me to see the quality of Windows under the hood... and my disappointment and distaste of the OS was not unwarranted.
Thank you for your cogent and highly informative post.
"Snowgirl" comes from a reference to Megatokyo's "sad girl in the snow". At the time I was picking a user name, it really struck a chord with me, and so I thought I would pay homage.
For the record, the only reason I responded about the grammatical point and only the grammatical point, was because I didn't disagree with anything else in the post. I was just more like "doh! you totally misunderstood me, and you're trying to say the same thing that I was trying to say."
In short, no, I don't know your gender, however it doesn't matter what your gender is, you're still an anti-feminist. You're also a troll, and you're also unwilling to face me even pseudonymously.
So, if you REALLY feel like you would like to discuss this stuff, drop the anonymity, and allow for an intelligent discussion, or else, I'm going to presume it's nothing different than Gabe's Greater Internet Fuckwad theory at work.
Well, of course the whole root of the problem of class wars are greed, and selfishness. So... ok, yes, I pretty much agree with you.
The only difference really I think between the feudal systems and what we have today, is people are no longer saddled with the idea that if we let someone into the oligarchy that our own benefits will decrease. We're starting to learn that there is "a lot" of room for everyone at every level, and that by breaking down legal class structures, we allow our own upward progress.
I think it kind of changed the world from looking at CYA, to ambition. One is very unlikely to lose class status for any reason, so there's no point in legally setting it in stone... especially when the cost is the ability to move up.
What is a judge going to be more impressed with - the original bill printed out by your supplier, that you have a copy of, that shows you're right... or a pdf you printed up on your computer?
If that PDF came off their website I should think it wouldn't make a difference. Are you really telling me that the PDF copy of my bank statement that's exactly the same as the dead tree version isn't as good?
The GP has a point. It's not that it isn't good enough. It's that the PDF is more impeachable. Grab a hexeditor, or a PDF editor, and go in, change some of the information to your favor, and voila, instant justification.
Are you working off genuine examination, and research, or are you just talking out of your butt?
Either way the shit is going out into the environment. One way it can go out is by being contained into a landfill, where in the United States, we have plenty of room, or it can be sent into the water systems. Although, it would be true that adult excrement is also going the same way.
However, a) landfills are not a problem, unless you're in a country that is already dealing with space issues, like Japan. The United States has absolutely NO shortage of land available for landfill space. And, if our population should continue at its present rate, we will STILL have enough landfill space for the foreseeable future.
You are correct that my mother didn't want to deal with the shit from cloth diapers. However, she already evaluated the impact of both sides, and found them to be equal before making that choice. If she had found a significant saving of impact, then she certainly would have used cloth diapers.
Of course, for some people "it ends up in a landfill" suddenly means that the environmental impact is impossible to recover at that point.
And by the way, snowgirl, this isn't personal. I am not some dope smoking hippy either. I just honestly think you've got it wrong. Which is why I mentioned the anecdotal comments your boy friends (who happened to work in the logging and paper industries) made; because you seem to believe what they said. Note the word 'anecdotal'. Yeah, it's very interesting what they said. Did they believe what they told you? Probably, but that is beside the point. For a start they are biased comments. Second, they were just comments! They were not the results of some extensive studies (or, if they were you didn't express it like they were). Anyway, as I said, I think you mean well and probably believe what your saying, but I think you're wrong. That is all. No offence intended.
No, I spent time myself in these replanted forests. My ex-boyfriend commented about how when he was in high school, he could see over a certain set of trees, and now it's incredibly diverse, and well grown. I know it's diverse, because I had to trek through it to find some privacy for a moment.
Now, to the point, I'm talking specifically and exclusively about the Olympic Peninsula. What other places are doing, I have no evidence of, neither do I have any idea what is going on outside of the United States. However, within the United States logging companies are very responsible, they know they need to be, because otherwise they will cut off a renewable resource by making it non-renewable.
The point still stands however from my title "more paper == more trees".
Something to bear in mind. The data centers are going to run anyway. They're going to store the information on a computer anyway. It doesn't matter what the saving is for not having the bill printed, that will always be saved.
The interesting thing is this was true forty years ago too. Your phone bill was processed by a mainframe and stored on massive loops of tape, but it was stored. Your bank records were stored on massive loops of tape, but they were stored. What's changed since then has been massive advances in random access mass storage technology coupled with the availability of an online network and the local processing capabilities needed to present data on a local screen.
Everything you need to switch to paperless already exists. It's infrastructure that's running anyway, and consuming power, regardless of whether you choose to use it. There is no negative environmental impact by going paperless.
Still... when you talk about a paperless society people talking about "saving the trees", not about "saving the energy required to make paper and ship bills".
I respect your belief, but I think you're wrong. Those plantations that grow the trees that you say will supply paper endlessly are, I hate to say it, finite in area. Therefore, the paper they can produce is finite. Now, I guess the other thing you're saying is that they're plantation trees being felled. Now, that is correct. But before it was a plantation it was probably a native forest. Now, those forests were cleared many years ago, so arguing the point now is... pointless--they're plantation trees now. Also, what happens when those areas can no longer supply the growing consumption of paper and other wood-derived products? They'll have to clear some more native forest for more plantations.
lololololol, "plantations". No, these are new growth forests. They are not "plantations" no one waters them, no one irrigates them, they are self-sustaining forests. If we walked away from these replanted forests, they would grow just fine, like they always did, and what are we replanting them with? The exact same trees that were there to begin with.
Perhaps I really should take some pictures of these forests, etc, and show people what "clear cut" logging actually looks like... if anything, for only a month or so, it's stumps, then clear cut, then growing NATURAL trees in NATURE, not in controlled "plantations".
I hate how people think that reducing paper will reduce environmental impact.
Why do you hate people thinking correctly? Regardless of the number of trees available, it still takes energy to make those sheets of paper, ship it to the consumer, and dispose of/recycle it once it's finished with. So, how does it not reduce environmental impact to use less paper?
Ok, using less of anything is going to make a better environmental impact. The question is, where is money and time better spent? Should we spend money on datacenters, and power grids to handle new-age paperless societies in countries that do not have a negative tree-growth rate? Or should we focus on spending money where it can actually make a difference?
Think of it this way... either I could be more environmental by buying a hybrid SUV and getting 30 miles per gallon instead of 7 miles per gallon, or I can get a geo metro, and a motorcycle, and get 50 miles per gallon unless I absolutely have to use a car?
I have problems with people not considering cost/benefits, and rather thinking about their own selfish holier-than-thou agenda.
You entirely missed the point of my article. Since when do socialist subsidized paid to individuals in order to prevent them from needing to slash and burn place the blame on those individuals?
Please note what I'm talking about this time. I'm saying that the multinational class war is the cause of slash and burn, not the individuals trying to meek an existence by.
I don't blame in anyway those who slash and burn the trees themselves, they're doing what they need to in order to survive. Rather, if _WE_ want to save the environment, we shouldn't bitch about using less trees for bills, but rather that we should be focusing on bringing up the poorer countries so that they don't have to resort to tactics that destroy the environment.
"Going green" is worthless if you're not enabling others to do the same.
There's good reason to shift the focus on to people who are doing the slash and burn. He didn't demonise them, he recognised that they have a very good reason to do what they're doing. And in the end they're the people who have to be helped if we want to do something about the problem. Going after the CEO of McDonald's might have the whole David vs Goliath feel but in this case beating the Goliath would do sweet fuck all. Another company would step in to fill their place, or 3 companies owned through the philippines would step in and do the same thing and sell on to a 4th based in the Bahamas which would sell on to McDonalds or Walmart or ten thousand independent little bars, cafes, restaurants and diners which are not part of any giant and easy to complain about company.
People really don't even read usernames do they...
Actually, it's economies of scale. Paper costs a fraction of a cent per sheet at the highest economy scales, like bill printing etc. Compare that to the cost of maintaining a data server, the cost of recycling the hardware eventually, etc etc etc.
Really, how many 1's and 0's will it take to match the price of paper? Let's take a single document I have saved from buying a box of chocolates online for my sister in Holland: 76kiB. While it's true that a single bit isn't that expensive, we've got over 608,000 of them in a single document...
Anyways the "paperless is green" idea isn't because we're going to run out of wood. Almost all paper is made from trees that are grown (and replanted and regrown) for that purpose. However turning that wood into paper and shipping it to the utility uses energy and money. Putting ink on the paper likewise isn't free, and mailing it (in postal trucks that burn gas) isn't free either.
Pushing bits around still costs money as well. Plus, in order to maintain their records, you need to have a datacenter up. I don't know about the economies of scale of the two systems, but just saying that you're saving the environment because of less paper doesn't necessary agree. Back when I was a child, my mother did the cost/benefits of disposable diapers vs cloth diapers, and found that the benefits of both wash each other out, and you're best off just using what you'd prefer to use. She elected the less-cleanup approach of disposables.
In any case, you get companies like e-surance than go out of their way to purport the claim that less paper bills == more trees, and that's simply, not the case.
I hate how people think that reducing paper will reduce environmental impact. Trees that are used for paper grow VERY fast, and even out here in the Pacific Northwest, in logging country, I've seen the clear cut fields, but what they don't show you, is across the road is a 5/10 year old forest that is already hella bigger than you ever thought trees could grow in 5/10 years. I dated an ex-logger for awhile, and he told me, "we cannot cut it down fast enough."
If you want to save trees, DON'T WORRY ABOUT PAPER OR WOOD PRODUCTS, those industries cannot use the wood fast enough. What you DO want to worry about are the people CLEAR CUTTING RAIN FOREST LAND in order to grow enough crop in order to feed their family. Give subsidizes to every farmer near the rain forests to not go out clear cutting, and WOW! Deforestation problem solved.
"Paperless is green" is a foul's quest. BTW, I also dated a guy working at a paper mill, toilet paper, and paper towels (even nice paper towels) are made from saw dust... the scrap that is left over from making lumber. They're actually using WASTE product to make their consumer products. So, again, use as much toilet paper as you want, we won't exceed available supplies of WASTE SAW DUST.
A mix of both approaches works best... System packages should follow the same basic structure, while user installed apps should be self contained within their own directory (and still have bin/lib/etc subdirs so you have order and structure...).
The windows approach is the worst of the lot, since you end up with lots of different types of files all lumped together in the windows and system32 directories.
*nod nod* I agree. The idea of both works very well.:) At least, it certainly does on Mac OSX...
Slashdot Mirror
The common shortcuts are too valuable to give up. Ctrl-C, Ctrl-V, Ctrl-X, Alt-F, etc. are all in the wrong place on the keyboard when you switch to Dvorak. I tried to learn it for a little while, but I quickly gave up after running into this real-world problem.
Yeah, I suppose I could've gone through and re-mapped those shortcuts, but that would've been a pain in the butt doing at every computer I ever sit down at, for every application.
OSX has a wonderful mapping "Dvorak - QWERTY CMD"
It makes it pretty awesome. :)
Actually, I pretty much don't think I need the health insurance if I'm working. Naturally, if I weren't working there, and thus contributing to the GDP, they wouldn't be interested in offering me national health insurance, however I wouldn't be able to just bum around in Germany for sure.
Well, if you want to see at least one more bright-minded foreigner, then you could always offer me a job/marriage. ;) lol
You cannot live as freely as you do in the US if you live in any of the Euro-Nazi countries. That's how most of the non-whites feel anyway. Racism is a big factor out there.
Not saying the US is completely devoid of it, but it's nothing that hinders your normal life here.
Not saying this is a particularly good thing, however, I'm an attractive white female (1/4 hispanic, but since it's white hispanic, no one notices... I just look well tanned)
I didn't choose Germany just willy nilly, actually, I already speak the language, know a lot of the culture, and already spent a month living there before.
One more time the bigotry triumphs. Leader of the world, biggest and strongest army ... locked away in his castle on the hilltop shooting at the mailman scared for his life. Congrats America, if that's what your freedom looks like ... no wonder "they" hate it. I do too. The USA used to be a symbol for immgration, diversity and -hell- freedom. Now it's become a symbol of lies, deception, bigotry, intolerance and paranoia. It makes me sad actually.
I'm kind of sad to be "stuck" in the United States. People point out that I'm able to immigrate to another country, but the truth it, is that immigration is tough. The country I would go to would be Germany, but I only get to live and work there for 3 months before I have to get full permission to stay indefinitely.
If the EU granted US citizens the right to immigrate freely, like they can within the EU, I would be there in a heartbeat.
I just get so disgusted at the xenophobia here in the US... seriously, do we HAVE to be this scared of "furriners"?
The hassles of coming into the US even as an American citizen have been plainly apparent to me every time I have traveled out of the country.
To Mexico? 25Â, bienvenido!
From Mexico? "Excuse me, ma'am, do you have your id? Can you prove you're a US citizen? Are you totally shit-faced drunk? Hold up there, your friend looks Mexican, we need to check him more thoroughly."
To Germany/Belgium: Hi there ma'am, passport? What are you here for? Awesome, enjoy our country. If you have anything to report, go to the red door, or more likely, just go walk through the green door, because no one is going to check you anyways. This is the entirety of our customs inspection. Just know that if we do randomly check you, and you were supposed to report something, you'll be fined.
From Germany/Belgium: Please fill out this form stating what you're bringing back to the US, or if you're a US citizen living abroad, what will be staying here after you leave. OMG, you have German-language versions of US film?! ARE YOU A TERRORIST?! WHY DON'T YOU WANT TO SPEAK ENGLISH?! Passport? Sorry, we have to hassle you more than you were hassled even in the foreign country, even though you're actually a citizen here, ok, not really sorry. Please obtain your luggage, go through customs. Oh, and even if you only reported bringing in anything that you have to legally declare, we're still going to check. Have you been on a farm? We want to make sure you didn't bring any farm animal fecal matter back... yeah, we can't trust that you washed the shit off your shoes before packing it into your suit-case. Ok, give your luggage back to your airline, you can go into the US now. Welcome, you probably missed your connecting flight, sorry.... ok, you're right, not really. We're sorry though, that we're not sorry about any of the hassles... oh wait, no we're not.
So far, what I've heard of visiting Canada:
To Canada: Hi Ma'am, welcome to Canada, eh.
From Canada: Can we see your passport? Are you a terrorist? May we check your car for illegal stuff? Why do you insist on this "search and seizure" stuff? OMG, you actually know US rights, you _HAVE_ to be a terrorist, because REAL US citizens are too ambivalent to know...
We would not have listened.
Just like Brazil is not listening. They have starving people who need room to grow food. And they also see the chance to be as prosperous as the U.S. by "taming" the wilderness. Dying people + wealth is a powerful combination which disfavors tree preservation.
I will agree to the discord in us telling them not to clearcut. However, recall, I'm suggesting offering them more lucrative ways to be as prosperous as the US without "taming" the wilderness.
Really, if we want them to listen to "don't make the same mistakes we did" then we had best offer alternatives, rather than simply the typical fundie statement "ZOMG DON'T DO IT!" I much prefer the rationalist statement "Ok, if you're going to do this, then here are the consequences... or, you could do this, and be happy _and_ avoid those consequences."
because as stated... "more paper == more trees".
But you haven't provided any evidence of that. One does not necessarily follow from the other.
I thought this was clear... in order to make more paper, we have to make more of the renewable resource that is used in its production... namely, trees.
This is the same reason why more popcorn == more corn, and more french fries == more potatoes.
This "open air" "land fill" that I was referring to was the Mesa... namely, the desert. People liter, it's a fact.
As for biological degradation, see Nylonase... if there is a source of nutrition available to a species, then if something mutates to be able to eat it, and nothing else is eating it, BOOM! population explosion.
I'm sorry, but I find this fear based approach to environmentalism to be just as hilarious as fundie christian ignorance. Landfills do not always pollute water tables. The idea that a child sheds polio virus into their feces once they've had the vaccine is equally stupid, because they are given an INACTIVE strain of polio virus... that means it cannot replicate. At the same time, the issue of dysentery: "Dysentery is typically the result of unsanitary water containing micro-organisms which damage the intestinal lining." Now, I'd like to ask you, where are you getting your tap water, that hasn't been filtered?
The EPA has strict controls on tap water quality that include particles smaller than micro-organisms. Between the time of treatment to be potable water, and your house are pipes. If there were actually a risk at all of microorganisms being in your tap water, the government would issue a warning to boil all water before you use it for potable purposes.
It's all just the same scare tactics, except instead of "ZOMG YOU'LL GO TO HELL IF YOU DON'T DO THIS!" it's "ZOMG DISEASE WILL GET YOU IF YOU DON'T DO THIS!" I can't help but draw a parallel between your fanaticism and arguments and the bullshit that is fundie religionism... that's not saying that you're WRONG, but rather saying that you should work harder to present an argument other than an appeal to fear/consequences.
Still... when you talk about a paperless society people talking about "saving the trees", not about "saving the energy required to make paper and ship bills".
Because ultimately it does have that effect. Paperless billing alone won't make the difference, but if society lowers consumption of wood-based products enough, then you start to need less logging activity. Less logging activity means more old-growth forest and biodiversity. You seem to be acting as if all trees are the same. They aren't. A plantation of commercial trees is not the same as a natural forest.
But yes, the immediate impact of paperless bills would be on energy consumption, because of the high rate of recycled material that goes into the the paper that bills are typically printed on.
But you'll agree that lumber uses far more wood than paper. One could take a single 2x4 from a house and likely make about a ream of paper from it.
In either case, the argument of biodiversity is entirely separate from "save the trees", because as stated... "more paper == more trees". If you want to increase CO_2 absorption of the planet, then any tree/plant will really do. True, some will work better than others, but at that point old growth and new growth forests are more or less equivalent.
From your article:
So the environmental impact of cloth and disposable diapers is roughly the same unless you live in an area where water or landfill spaces is in short supply.
In New Mexico, where my parents live, water is in short supply, and landfill space is in large supply.
So, at least in New Mexico, it's generally better to use disposables. As for the 500 year break down argument, oddly enough, an orange peel thrown on the ground will take longer to deteriorate than any of aluminum, plastic or paper. This is because the three later ones deteriorate well from environmental factors. (Specifically plastics. Plastics break down from exposure to light, which is abundant in New Mexico.) While the orange peel requires organisms that thrive in a moist environment.
This isn't really just anecdote either, seriously, you'll be walking around the Mesa, and there are orange peels all over, as well as cans and plastic objects. If you kick them, the orange peels are fully solid and don't break apart, although the cans and plastics will just obliterate.
Windows crash? MS sucks!
Well, in my case, I don't hate Windows because of crashes. I've used it a lot in the past, and had for awhile at a previous job.
That previous job was actually at Microsoft, which allowed me to see the quality of Windows under the hood... and my disappointment and distaste of the OS was not unwarranted.
Thank you for your cogent and highly informative post.
"Snowgirl" comes from a reference to Megatokyo's "sad girl in the snow". At the time I was picking a user name, it really struck a chord with me, and so I thought I would pay homage.
For the record, the only reason I responded about the grammatical point and only the grammatical point, was because I didn't disagree with anything else in the post. I was just more like "doh! you totally misunderstood me, and you're trying to say the same thing that I was trying to say."
In short, no, I don't know your gender, however it doesn't matter what your gender is, you're still an anti-feminist. You're also a troll, and you're also unwilling to face me even pseudonymously.
So, if you REALLY feel like you would like to discuss this stuff, drop the anonymity, and allow for an intelligent discussion, or else, I'm going to presume it's nothing different than Gabe's Greater Internet Fuckwad theory at work.
Well, of course the whole root of the problem of class wars are greed, and selfishness. So... ok, yes, I pretty much agree with you.
The only difference really I think between the feudal systems and what we have today, is people are no longer saddled with the idea that if we let someone into the oligarchy that our own benefits will decrease. We're starting to learn that there is "a lot" of room for everyone at every level, and that by breaking down legal class structures, we allow our own upward progress.
I think it kind of changed the world from looking at CYA, to ambition. One is very unlikely to lose class status for any reason, so there's no point in legally setting it in stone... especially when the cost is the ability to move up.
What is a judge going to be more impressed with - the original bill printed out by your supplier, that you have a copy of, that shows you're right ... or a pdf you printed up on your computer?
If that PDF came off their website I should think it wouldn't make a difference. Are you really telling me that the PDF copy of my bank statement that's exactly the same as the dead tree version isn't as good?
The GP has a point. It's not that it isn't good enough. It's that the PDF is more impeachable. Grab a hexeditor, or a PDF editor, and go in, change some of the information to your favor, and voila, instant justification.
Are you working off genuine examination, and research, or are you just talking out of your butt?
Either way the shit is going out into the environment. One way it can go out is by being contained into a landfill, where in the United States, we have plenty of room, or it can be sent into the water systems. Although, it would be true that adult excrement is also going the same way.
However, a) landfills are not a problem, unless you're in a country that is already dealing with space issues, like Japan. The United States has absolutely NO shortage of land available for landfill space. And, if our population should continue at its present rate, we will STILL have enough landfill space for the foreseeable future.
You are correct that my mother didn't want to deal with the shit from cloth diapers. However, she already evaluated the impact of both sides, and found them to be equal before making that choice. If she had found a significant saving of impact, then she certainly would have used cloth diapers.
Of course, for some people "it ends up in a landfill" suddenly means that the environmental impact is impossible to recover at that point.
And by the way, snowgirl, this isn't personal. I am not some dope smoking hippy either. I just honestly think you've got it wrong. Which is why I mentioned the anecdotal comments your boy friends (who happened to work in the logging and paper industries) made; because you seem to believe what they said. Note the word 'anecdotal'. Yeah, it's very interesting what they said. Did they believe what they told you? Probably, but that is beside the point. For a start they are biased comments. Second, they were just comments! They were not the results of some extensive studies (or, if they were you didn't express it like they were). Anyway, as I said, I think you mean well and probably believe what your saying, but I think you're wrong. That is all. No offence intended.
No, I spent time myself in these replanted forests. My ex-boyfriend commented about how when he was in high school, he could see over a certain set of trees, and now it's incredibly diverse, and well grown. I know it's diverse, because I had to trek through it to find some privacy for a moment.
Now, to the point, I'm talking specifically and exclusively about the Olympic Peninsula. What other places are doing, I have no evidence of, neither do I have any idea what is going on outside of the United States. However, within the United States logging companies are very responsible, they know they need to be, because otherwise they will cut off a renewable resource by making it non-renewable.
The point still stands however from my title "more paper == more trees".
Something to bear in mind. The data centers are going to run anyway. They're going to store the information on a computer anyway. It doesn't matter what the saving is for not having the bill printed, that will always be saved.
The interesting thing is this was true forty years ago too. Your phone bill was processed by a mainframe and stored on massive loops of tape, but it was stored. Your bank records were stored on massive loops of tape, but they were stored. What's changed since then has been massive advances in random access mass storage technology coupled with the availability of an online network and the local processing capabilities needed to present data on a local screen.
Everything you need to switch to paperless already exists. It's infrastructure that's running anyway, and consuming power, regardless of whether you choose to use it. There is no negative environmental impact by going paperless.
Still... when you talk about a paperless society people talking about "saving the trees", not about "saving the energy required to make paper and ship bills".
I respect your belief, but I think you're wrong. Those plantations that grow the trees that you say will supply paper endlessly are, I hate to say it, finite in area. Therefore, the paper they can produce is finite. Now, I guess the other thing you're saying is that they're plantation trees being felled. Now, that is correct. But before it was a plantation it was probably a native forest. Now, those forests were cleared many years ago, so arguing the point now is... pointless--they're plantation trees now. Also, what happens when those areas can no longer supply the growing consumption of paper and other wood-derived products? They'll have to clear some more native forest for more plantations.
lololololol, "plantations". No, these are new growth forests. They are not "plantations" no one waters them, no one irrigates them, they are self-sustaining forests. If we walked away from these replanted forests, they would grow just fine, like they always did, and what are we replanting them with? The exact same trees that were there to begin with.
Perhaps I really should take some pictures of these forests, etc, and show people what "clear cut" logging actually looks like... if anything, for only a month or so, it's stumps, then clear cut, then growing NATURAL trees in NATURE, not in controlled "plantations".
I hate how people think that reducing paper will reduce environmental impact.
Why do you hate people thinking correctly? Regardless of the number of trees available, it still takes energy to make those sheets of paper, ship it to the consumer, and dispose of/recycle it once it's finished with. So, how does it not reduce environmental impact to use less paper?
Ok, using less of anything is going to make a better environmental impact. The question is, where is money and time better spent? Should we spend money on datacenters, and power grids to handle new-age paperless societies in countries that do not have a negative tree-growth rate? Or should we focus on spending money where it can actually make a difference?
Think of it this way... either I could be more environmental by buying a hybrid SUV and getting 30 miles per gallon instead of 7 miles per gallon, or I can get a geo metro, and a motorcycle, and get 50 miles per gallon unless I absolutely have to use a car?
I have problems with people not considering cost/benefits, and rather thinking about their own selfish holier-than-thou agenda.
Use napalm. Trees don't surf.
Ok, more accurately, they _COULD_ cut it down fast enough... but they wouldn't be able to make a profit doing it... :)
You entirely missed the point of my article. Since when do socialist subsidized paid to individuals in order to prevent them from needing to slash and burn place the blame on those individuals?
Please note what I'm talking about this time. I'm saying that the multinational class war is the cause of slash and burn, not the individuals trying to meek an existence by.
I don't blame in anyway those who slash and burn the trees themselves, they're doing what they need to in order to survive. Rather, if _WE_ want to save the environment, we shouldn't bitch about using less trees for bills, but rather that we should be focusing on bringing up the poorer countries so that they don't have to resort to tactics that destroy the environment.
"Going green" is worthless if you're not enabling others to do the same.
There's good reason to shift the focus on to people who are doing the slash and burn. He didn't demonise them, he recognised that they have a very good reason to do what they're doing. And in the end they're the people who have to be helped if we want to do something about the problem. Going after the CEO of McDonald's might have the whole David vs Goliath feel but in this case beating the Goliath would do sweet fuck all. Another company would step in to fill their place, or 3 companies owned through the philippines would step in and do the same thing and sell on to a 4th based in the Bahamas which would sell on to McDonalds or Walmart or ten thousand independent little bars, cafes, restaurants and diners which are not part of any giant and easy to complain about company.
People really don't even read usernames do they...
Actually, it's economies of scale. Paper costs a fraction of a cent per sheet at the highest economy scales, like bill printing etc. Compare that to the cost of maintaining a data server, the cost of recycling the hardware eventually, etc etc etc.
Really, how many 1's and 0's will it take to match the price of paper? Let's take a single document I have saved from buying a box of chocolates online for my sister in Holland: 76kiB. While it's true that a single bit isn't that expensive, we've got over 608,000 of them in a single document...
Anyways the "paperless is green" idea isn't because we're going to run out of wood. Almost all paper is made from trees that are grown (and replanted and regrown) for that purpose. However turning that wood into paper and shipping it to the utility uses energy and money. Putting ink on the paper likewise isn't free, and mailing it (in postal trucks that burn gas) isn't free either.
Pushing bits around still costs money as well. Plus, in order to maintain their records, you need to have a datacenter up. I don't know about the economies of scale of the two systems, but just saying that you're saving the environment because of less paper doesn't necessary agree. Back when I was a child, my mother did the cost/benefits of disposable diapers vs cloth diapers, and found that the benefits of both wash each other out, and you're best off just using what you'd prefer to use. She elected the less-cleanup approach of disposables.
In any case, you get companies like e-surance than go out of their way to purport the claim that less paper bills == more trees, and that's simply, not the case.
I hate how people think that reducing paper will reduce environmental impact. Trees that are used for paper grow VERY fast, and even out here in the Pacific Northwest, in logging country, I've seen the clear cut fields, but what they don't show you, is across the road is a 5/10 year old forest that is already hella bigger than you ever thought trees could grow in 5/10 years. I dated an ex-logger for awhile, and he told me, "we cannot cut it down fast enough."
If you want to save trees, DON'T WORRY ABOUT PAPER OR WOOD PRODUCTS, those industries cannot use the wood fast enough. What you DO want to worry about are the people CLEAR CUTTING RAIN FOREST LAND in order to grow enough crop in order to feed their family. Give subsidizes to every farmer near the rain forests to not go out clear cutting, and WOW! Deforestation problem solved.
"Paperless is green" is a foul's quest. BTW, I also dated a guy working at a paper mill, toilet paper, and paper towels (even nice paper towels) are made from saw dust... the scrap that is left over from making lumber. They're actually using WASTE product to make their consumer products. So, again, use as much toilet paper as you want, we won't exceed available supplies of WASTE SAW DUST.
A mix of both approaches works best...
System packages should follow the same basic structure, while user installed apps should be self contained within their own directory (and still have bin/lib/etc subdirs so you have order and structure...).
The windows approach is the worst of the lot, since you end up with lots of different types of files all lumped together in the windows and system32 directories.
*nod nod* I agree. The idea of both works very well. :) At least, it certainly does on Mac OSX...