Well, that's why you weigh BOTH costs and benefits. I'm not saying cost is the ultimate decider, but rather benefits per unit cost. For example, sure we could terraform another planet and move the whole human population there. That would fix the problem of climate change, but at extreme cost. A better solution to climate change would be fixing the planet we have now, resulting in the same benefits (a sustainable biosystem), but at much lower cost.
Another more down to Earth example (haha) is that of aluminum cans. The result you want is an aluminum can to put your soda in, but you have two methods of arriving at that end result: process ore and extrude the can from a newly created aluminum ingot or by recycling a previously existing aluminum can. Both result in a ready to distribute can, but one method uses 90% less energy.
My point is that we can apply this to climate change. Why seed the ocean with iron and phosphates and take on one set of risks when we could try another method, such as aerosol engineering, that might have a more acceptable or controllable set of risks. All I'm saying is let's pick the low hanging fruit first. Let's get off coal, switch to renewables, increase efficiency, and stop clear cutting before we start doing the more drastic, less researched geoengineering options.
As for your worry that people might set upon with cheap, but ineffective methods because of a cost/benefit analysis, that shouldn't happen. If you divide cheap by zero benefit, you don't get "cheap", you get "waste of money". However, if it were possible to solve 0.5% of our carbon problem through... say a $50 million per year program, that might be worth doing, even if it's a tiny benefit. That's because adding a bunch of small costs and small benefits can get us where we need to go, perhaps making those expensive programs with larger risks unnecessary.
There is always a reason for cost/benefit analysis. In this case, it doesn't have to mean weighing the costs and benefits of doing something or doing nothing, but rather the difference between one method of climate correction versus another method, e.g. iron seeding versus aerosol engineering.
Just because we're doing this for our survival doesn't mean that we have unlimited resources or that there aren't opportunity costs.
Isn't leadership the ability to convince a lot of other people (who may or may not agree with you initially) that what you want is actually what they all want?
any government school system will always pale in comparison to a private one because the government is terrible at managing anything.
I like how you can present this as if it were fact or in anyway demonstrable through evidence. Or that the corollary, that businesses are superior at managing, would also be true.
Organizations, both public and private, are as good or as poor as the people that make up the organization. I think the current economic crisis would be an excellent example of how private organizations can be as terrible at their task as you think all public organizations are.
If you had been reading the Consumerist recently, you would have known that they recently updated Michael Dell's email address. "michael@dell.com" is the direct line.
Depends if the mammoths will greet us as ressurectors once we get there. I think we could get the whole species going for $80 billion, at most! Even better, once we get their population stable once again, they'll be able to start underwriting our initial investment in their country... Wait, what were we talking about again?
You weren't forced to make an Avatar. When I did my update, I wanted to get to test Netflix as quickly as possible, so I just pulled up the guide and exited out of the Avatar builder to the dashboard. Just like before with any other application.
You're complaining about having to do too many clicks around the interface? With the old blades, you had to cycle to the blade you wanted, say Marketplace, and then scroll down to the category you wanted. Same with the new system, but instead of moving through the categories horizontally, you scroll through them vertically and then choose your category or item by scrolling horizontally. Except now the categories and items are laid out in only two axes rather than having items scattered all through out the blade they were on. The layout is cleaner and more logical because of the changes.
MSFT didn't promise that they were keeping the blades. They specifically said that the NXE was to replace the blade system and that the blades would only be preserved in the Guide system.
The Avatars may be useless and silly, but really, an "eyesore"? Maybe you should make a better looking one?
I'm happy to finally have an OS that's responsive and allows me to scroll through and read descriptions for items quickly. I think you're a bit worked up over the idea of "change" so much that you can't see the improvements.
I can buy the retconning of Kirk being a classic car gear head. ST:TWOK established that Kirk was big on antiques and other items of historical significance. It makes sense that Kirk had an early interest in more exciting forms of antiques (e.g. classic hot rods). He probably needed that excitement out in Iowa and that region would have certainly given him the space to have such a hobby (in contrast to someone who grew up in San Francisco or on a starbase).
Except when you're standing on the Galaxy-class bridge in Star Trek The Experience, they have the group that just beamed in standing by the port turbolift, between the tactical station and the aft auxiliary stations, thus allowing easy access to the Engineering console. Though, because of LCARS, it would be easy to reconfigure any console to allow me to re-route auxiliary power. But then again, it would be easier and quicker to use the bridge engineering console, as reconfiguring another console to allow me to re-route power might have wasted enough time that it would be necessary route emergency power.
I think there's an expectation that Biden will be balanced out by the tech-savvy Obama team. Furthermore, people expect that Biden is open to reasoned arguments on the subject. For example, he might get questioned about it during a town hall meeting, think "Hmm...", and then call up Al Gore later on and get a magical lecture about the transformational and democratizing qualities of the internet.
I'm surprised by how many developers make games without looking to Valve. From all the articles I've read about how Valve develops games, it seems they have the right philosophy. They playtest their games starting the moment they have something you can play. I think it was a Gamasutra article that told the story of Portal's development where they had the playtesters playing nearly every nightly, always giving the developers feedback on what was working and what wasn't. It sounds to me that that's the way to make a really polished game.
That's not to say that you focus group your game into mediocrity. It's about setting gameplay and story-telling goals and making sure you meet those with direct feedback from gamers.
I use Steam for a bunch of games, it works really well. It allows me to have game portability. I can just go over to someone's comp, download steam, log in, download the game, and I'm ready to go. Sure I'm trading the need for having a CD in the drive for needing an internet connection, but it gives me flexibility. Steam is now the provider for a plethora of classic and indie games as well. It's probably the best implementation of DRM I've seen next to Stardock's (no DRM).
The DRM issues that surrounded Bioshock when it came out and as mentioned further up in the comments is related to DRM on top of Steam.
What's more, Steam actually has sales every once in a while, which other digital distribution channels like Xbox Live Marketplace, rarely have. I've picked up a few gems that I never would have under normal circumstances because of Steam discounts, like Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines, Day of Defeat Source, and Defcon.
If this weren't closing today, I'd probably go back right now and push buttons too. If a Lt caught me, I would just claim "I'm rerouting auxiliary power". As any Trekker knows, rerouting auxiliary power is probably the most important thing in a starship battle, right after raising shields and holding on for dear life.
I went about two years ago and I will also agree that it was looking a bit run down at that point. But the museum was spectacular, especially the 15ft Galaxy-class model. And that transporter effect, it completely surprised me and I still wonder how they pulled it off.
When the rest of the intelligent population of this lazy ass country get off their asses long enough to cast a fucking vote, we'll be doing a lot better.
I vote. I'm sure a lot of other "intelligent" people vote. The problem is that the people who are closer to the "creationist" category don't believe in contraception or abortion.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, that's why you weigh BOTH costs and benefits. I'm not saying cost is the ultimate decider, but rather benefits per unit cost. For example, sure we could terraform another planet and move the whole human population there. That would fix the problem of climate change, but at extreme cost. A better solution to climate change would be fixing the planet we have now, resulting in the same benefits (a sustainable biosystem), but at much lower cost.
Another more down to Earth example (haha) is that of aluminum cans. The result you want is an aluminum can to put your soda in, but you have two methods of arriving at that end result: process ore and extrude the can from a newly created aluminum ingot or by recycling a previously existing aluminum can. Both result in a ready to distribute can, but one method uses 90% less energy.
My point is that we can apply this to climate change. Why seed the ocean with iron and phosphates and take on one set of risks when we could try another method, such as aerosol engineering, that might have a more acceptable or controllable set of risks. All I'm saying is let's pick the low hanging fruit first. Let's get off coal, switch to renewables, increase efficiency, and stop clear cutting before we start doing the more drastic, less researched geoengineering options.
As for your worry that people might set upon with cheap, but ineffective methods because of a cost/benefit analysis, that shouldn't happen. If you divide cheap by zero benefit, you don't get "cheap", you get "waste of money". However, if it were possible to solve 0.5% of our carbon problem through... say a $50 million per year program, that might be worth doing, even if it's a tiny benefit. That's because adding a bunch of small costs and small benefits can get us where we need to go, perhaps making those expensive programs with larger risks unnecessary.
There is always a reason for cost/benefit analysis. In this case, it doesn't have to mean weighing the costs and benefits of doing something or doing nothing, but rather the difference between one method of climate correction versus another method, e.g. iron seeding versus aerosol engineering.
Just because we're doing this for our survival doesn't mean that we have unlimited resources or that there aren't opportunity costs.
Furthermore where I live backing up a DVD you own is illegal.
You can back up your DVD to your laptop, the trick is to avoid calling up Dan Glickman and letting him know to torrent it off your comp.
It's only illegal if you get caught. As long as you're the only one watching them, I'm pretty sure you're not going to turn yourself in.
Helmsman: "But sir, she'll fly apart!"
Cpt. Sulu: "Fly her apart then!"
Isn't leadership the ability to convince a lot of other people (who may or may not agree with you initially) that what you want is actually what they all want?
any government school system will always pale in comparison to a private one because the government is terrible at managing anything.
I like how you can present this as if it were fact or in anyway demonstrable through evidence. Or that the corollary, that businesses are superior at managing, would also be true.
Organizations, both public and private, are as good or as poor as the people that make up the organization. I think the current economic crisis would be an excellent example of how private organizations can be as terrible at their task as you think all public organizations are.
If you had been reading the Consumerist recently, you would have known that they recently updated Michael Dell's email address. "michael@dell.com" is the direct line.
Depends if the mammoths will greet us as ressurectors once we get there. I think we could get the whole species going for $80 billion, at most! Even better, once we get their population stable once again, they'll be able to start underwriting our initial investment in their country... Wait, what were we talking about again?
You weren't forced to make an Avatar. When I did my update, I wanted to get to test Netflix as quickly as possible, so I just pulled up the guide and exited out of the Avatar builder to the dashboard. Just like before with any other application.
You're complaining about having to do too many clicks around the interface? With the old blades, you had to cycle to the blade you wanted, say Marketplace, and then scroll down to the category you wanted. Same with the new system, but instead of moving through the categories horizontally, you scroll through them vertically and then choose your category or item by scrolling horizontally. Except now the categories and items are laid out in only two axes rather than having items scattered all through out the blade they were on. The layout is cleaner and more logical because of the changes.
MSFT didn't promise that they were keeping the blades. They specifically said that the NXE was to replace the blade system and that the blades would only be preserved in the Guide system.
The Avatars may be useless and silly, but really, an "eyesore"? Maybe you should make a better looking one?
I'm happy to finally have an OS that's responsive and allows me to scroll through and read descriptions for items quickly. I think you're a bit worked up over the idea of "change" so much that you can't see the improvements.
I can buy the retconning of Kirk being a classic car gear head. ST:TWOK established that Kirk was big on antiques and other items of historical significance. It makes sense that Kirk had an early interest in more exciting forms of antiques (e.g. classic hot rods). He probably needed that excitement out in Iowa and that region would have certainly given him the space to have such a hobby (in contrast to someone who grew up in San Francisco or on a starbase).
Speedy solar particles go in, speedy solar particles come out!
While we're at it, can we get one against George Lucas as well? I want this prequel to be good!
I am thoroughly "shocked and awed" by the actions of the EPA under this administration, just like Mr. Rumsfeld would have wanted.
See Canada?! That's why your economy is in the tank and ours is.... oh wait...
If they saw off one end of one of the ISS modules, they could make the largest cantenna ever!
Except when you're standing on the Galaxy-class bridge in Star Trek The Experience, they have the group that just beamed in standing by the port turbolift, between the tactical station and the aft auxiliary stations, thus allowing easy access to the Engineering console. Though, because of LCARS, it would be easy to reconfigure any console to allow me to re-route auxiliary power. But then again, it would be easier and quicker to use the bridge engineering console, as reconfiguring another console to allow me to re-route power might have wasted enough time that it would be necessary route emergency power.
I think there's an expectation that Biden will be balanced out by the tech-savvy Obama team. Furthermore, people expect that Biden is open to reasoned arguments on the subject. For example, he might get questioned about it during a town hall meeting, think "Hmm...", and then call up Al Gore later on and get a magical lecture about the transformational and democratizing qualities of the internet.
I'm surprised by how many developers make games without looking to Valve. From all the articles I've read about how Valve develops games, it seems they have the right philosophy. They playtest their games starting the moment they have something you can play. I think it was a Gamasutra article that told the story of Portal's development where they had the playtesters playing nearly every nightly, always giving the developers feedback on what was working and what wasn't. It sounds to me that that's the way to make a really polished game.
That's not to say that you focus group your game into mediocrity. It's about setting gameplay and story-telling goals and making sure you meet those with direct feedback from gamers.
I use Steam for a bunch of games, it works really well. It allows me to have game portability. I can just go over to someone's comp, download steam, log in, download the game, and I'm ready to go. Sure I'm trading the need for having a CD in the drive for needing an internet connection, but it gives me flexibility. Steam is now the provider for a plethora of classic and indie games as well. It's probably the best implementation of DRM I've seen next to Stardock's (no DRM).
The DRM issues that surrounded Bioshock when it came out and as mentioned further up in the comments is related to DRM on top of Steam.
What's more, Steam actually has sales every once in a while, which other digital distribution channels like Xbox Live Marketplace, rarely have. I've picked up a few gems that I never would have under normal circumstances because of Steam discounts, like Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines, Day of Defeat Source, and Defcon.
"No honey, it's not what it seems! She's the physical therapist for my genetic handicap!"
If this weren't closing today, I'd probably go back right now and push buttons too. If a Lt caught me, I would just claim "I'm rerouting auxiliary power". As any Trekker knows, rerouting auxiliary power is probably the most important thing in a starship battle, right after raising shields and holding on for dear life.
I went about two years ago and I will also agree that it was looking a bit run down at that point. But the museum was spectacular, especially the 15ft Galaxy-class model. And that transporter effect, it completely surprised me and I still wonder how they pulled it off.
When the rest of the intelligent population of this lazy ass country get off their asses long enough to cast a fucking vote, we'll be doing a lot better.
I vote. I'm sure a lot of other "intelligent" people vote. The problem is that the people who are closer to the "creationist" category don't believe in contraception or abortion.
They're OUTBREEDING us. Idiocracy, here we come.
I thought that Nancy Pelosi would cover that?
He must have been referring to Nixon's language.