Phi for All

HutchBronze was spambanned as a sockpuppet of ADVANCE. It's not worth what this does to your credibility.

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I don't think the brain's electrochemistry is affected in the same way as electronics are affected by strong EM.

Pirates, every one of them.

I think this may be your perspective. There are certainly groups out there that wield fear like a sword, but you can't compare them with messages like the OP shared, imo. The world won't end, but the environment we enjoy may be changed in ways we can't cope with. Asking people to care about that isn't fear-mongering, imo.

It's one thing to be aware, and another to ignore. That's really what's at the heart of this matter, right? Global problems require global support, and activism is one way to make people aware. Aware people can act smartly, armed with facts and broad perspectives. Smart activism should influence us to take action. Why ignore that kind of activism? Activism makes more sense than waiting for a government to take a stand, especially if it's heavily influenced by those who would lose a little profit to regulatory rigor. I like the presentation. This problem needs more than just "preaching to the choir", we need ways to reach out to those who shy away from the normal presentation. I'm thinking this video should be recreated at the next Superbowl half-time, using several marching bands to show the graphs, while Scarlett Johansson sings and pole-dances through multiple wardrobe malfunctions. Most FOX News types would switch from Bill O'Reilly to see that.

There are incentives/subsidies for reducing consumption, through state Public Utility Commissions. It's usually in the form of a rebate to help install solar or an energy efficient HVAC system or more efficient lighting. Demand-side management is an ongoing effort, and there are a LOT of products out there designed for more efficient electrical use. The US has a lot of commercial buildings with up-to-date computer and security systems, but they're using lighting and HVAC systems from the Reagan 80s when they removed Jimmy Carter's solar panels from the White House.

Most Republicans want to keep big government from sticking its nose in our business. But some want the government to tell you what to do with your own body, the ultimate in "my business". This is a HUGE conflict of interest on a basic platform point. Most Republicans cherish the Constitution as a viable historic template for our republic. But some want to change a few things in their favor, because they're the ones who create the jobs, which is much more important than actually doing the jobs. Another conflict of interest. Most Republicans favor market solutions. But some want special legislative considerations for their businesses that give them an edge over the competition. An unbelievably huge conflict of interest. The party is full of conflicts born of ignorance and agenda. It's hard to say where one starts and the other takes over, but it seems to be a fairly parasitic relationship. Seeing as how we've known for a while that humans can affect climate through abuse (early 20th century cartographers tracking climate change in mainland China due to deforestation), I think climate change deniers fall into two camps, those whose businesses or livelihoods would be adversely affected if they had to control their impact on the climate, and those who don't understand science and so fall prey to whatever propaganda the first camp puts out. I think the way to eliminate this is to ask people what they think would happen if we all paid attention to what scientists are telling us. Their answer will tell you if this is what they HOPE will happen, or what they FEAR will happen. Key on educating the people who HOPE. I wouldn't waste my time on the people who FEAR, there's just too much science they're unwilling to learn.

There's a fear-of-disease/violence factor that I'm not sure is being considered in the video. It's not just grubby clothes that make people avoid the first guy. Who knows where he's been to catch something that knocked him on his butt like that? Cheap = Grubby = Dirty = Disease = Infectious. Or maybe he's on a drug that makes him psychotic, and if I go to help him he may lash out. He could also simply be drunk and passed out. The longer he lies there with no one helping him, the more each new person seeing him thinks someone has already addressed his problem, or called the authorities. If the people who see him fall don't do anything, it's unlikely he'll get help. The guy in the suit, for the instant you're thinking about it before going to help him, has a much more attractive imagined itinerary. He's probably just come from lunch and got some bad food, or he's too stressed at work and passed out on the street. It's not nearly as likely he's on drugs, or he picked up something contagious he'll pass along to you if you help. He's also the last guy you suspect of grabbing you by the eyeballs when you bend over to help him. And you'll notice that the guy in the suit gets helped by the people who see him fall. It's that instant where clothes may help or harm, imo, by removing any unsavory perceptions as obstacles to getting help. Not to defend the actions. One could easily get help for anyone without touching them. But I don't think it's just Parisians being offended by a lack of sartorial style here.

I used to dress up even if I was working from home, just to get in the right mindset. Over the years though, I learned to sound like I was wearing a suit while in sweats. I drew the line at bathrobes, though. There is absolutely no productivity in a bathrobe. I'm finding it more interesting these days to gauge how my clients perceive what I'm wearing. If I wear a shirt and tie, I see the salesman-shields get raised. If I wear my jeans with my company-logoed jacket and carry a clipboard, I'm more like your plumber and much less threatening.

The meter will run backwards if you're selling more electricity back to your utility than you're using. And most likely your utility company is investor-owned, so it's not the government anymore (your municipality chose to sell off it's rights to a publicly owned system), just a government regulated system. Right now, they're happy to help people reduce their consumption through the use of solar and other efficiency upgrades. The more they can help you reduce your demand-side needs, the less likely they'll have to increase the supply-side. Nobody wants them to build more power plants.

I understand kneejerk reactions to those who don't do things the way your group does, but most of the replies have been extremely rational and reasonable. People kissing in this way aren't doing anything sexual, and it's not like you have to be married to kiss someone like this. Yet those who object object for sexual reasons, so if anyone is a pervert here, it's the conservatives who want their nose in your business. We need to fund a study on whether conservatism, especially religion-based, anti-unacceptable-lifestyle conservatism, actually makes humans shorter. I can only conclude that these explanations are simply going over their heads.

No question about it. This type of kiss isn't about sex, it's about affection and happiness. IMO, the people expressing outrage are the ones harming children by making this about sex.

I'm guilty of projecting my horror at the idea of another Bush in the White House. Personally, I think his connection to his brother should be enough to make any intelligent voter blanch, but basing an argument on incredulity and rational thought is what gets the left of center every time. Bush III will never get elected, people will remember how his brother screwed up the whole world under his watch, right? Right?! Right.

Isn't reincarnation supposed to be working towards some sort of ultimate perfection? We don't see that in evolution. Not all adaptations are "improvements", and some can be quite a pain in the back. Or retina. Or coccyx. How would you test this idea? What is passing from the dying to the newly born that you could classify as an evolutionary trait? How does it pass? If it's a form of energy, how is it moving and how does it choose where it's going?

This misses the point completely. The TV show merely sets up a situation where we might discuss how modern mammals stack up against dinosaurs from different eras. We could just as easily use the premise that modern mammals are somehow transported to various earlier periods to encounter the dinosaurs in their own environment, only we don't have a TV show to provide the "somehow".

Don't use his first name again, please. EVER. The brand is "Bush", and I think it's important to stay true to that.

Very, very interesting, and I'd not heard that. I'd heard that certain US interests at the time lobbied to have hemp in general banned, namely the liquor, lumber and cotton barons, but I have nothing to back that up. It just seemed likely, and it seems just as likely even if the impetus came from Egypt.

It seems like the parts of your concept you enjoy the most, the... elasticity of a math-free environment and the ability to leap tall objections with a single dismissive bound, these parts are what's frustrating the folks who're trained to spot where the rigor is weak. The more vague you are about how you arrive at your conclusions, the more people try to show how the math doesn't support you, the more you say math isn't needed for what you want to do, the more they say that what you're doing isn't science. I don't see a way smart thinking by itself can help. The methodology insists you take the reviews of your peers on board and answer all their rebuttals, but you've hobbled this review process by insisting on a lingual approach. Invoking common sense won't work. Is it common sense to put out a forest fire, or to let it burn naturally? Most of the scientific method is designed to minimize subjective claims and the opinions and biases of the scientist. Sorry for the gloom and doom, but I know you're concerned that folks are getting frustrated and it's starting to affect your reputation. You're a sweetheart of a guy, Mike, but you're not kicking a stubborn old badger here; you're jumping from ice floe to ice floe with no ground in sight and your peers are trying to tell you it's not safe to do science that way.

This very sentence is inscribed on the tombstones of many failed inquiries. Common sense is anything but common, and certainly isn't objective enough to be used in a scientific setting, and therefore makes a shaky foundation at best.

I think you hit the nail here. Our "civilization" is currently made up of a large part of 21st century processes, and a large part of Dark Ages processes, with another large part stuck somewhere in the Puritan era. The more hidebound an ideology is, the less personal and more evangelistic it becomes, imo. The need to convert people or consider them outsiders is where this practice is really detrimental to our civilization. The better way you mention, again imo, is a secular education for everyone on the planet. Knowledge will provide clean water, good food, better buildings, less corruption, healthier economies, stronger social structure, and a whole host of other benefits that will help lessen the fear that can make people act irrationally.

If we use the Primeval concept, where dinosaur(s) from a specific era pop into our modern world, I think we can focus this discussion. Otherwise we're arguing completely different things. I also think, for these purposes, we can say that the rifts we're talking about happen in areas with no human inhabitants, but varied other animal populations. Sound fair? I'd love to see a wolf pack adapt to various dino prey. A pride of lions working in cooperation is pretty amazing too.

Good morning, everyone! The Colorado state Senate just passed a bill that will allow a banking coop to be set up for MJ and hemp growers. The Federal Reserve has final say, and this will be a very interesting showdown. One of the big hurdles for growers is that Federal law is still being enforced, and banks are subject to the Fed. Banks have been reluctant to open accounts for growers that may end in seizures and penalties. The dispensaries can't accept credit cards so they have to have ATM machines which need to be stocked multiple times per day, security to protect the cash they take in, and other costly considerations most businesses take for granted, because they have a bank.

Isn't that how thick it would be if compressed into an ozone-only layer? It's my understanding that the ozone layer is several kilometers deep, varies greatly around the world and in different seasons, but is more of a concentration of ozone that's like an order of magnitude greater than normal.

We have certain strengths as a species. Really high intelligence. Upright walking frees our hands for tool use. An outrageous ability to communicate in fine detail. Cooperative skills that allow for innovation rather than hive-mind. There's more, but it's really the combination that gives birth to our imaginations, which turns out to be a very bittersweet effect. We imagine both good and bad things, and we fear the bad, often to the point of irrationality. Personally, I think it was being able to look into the shadows and imagine the tiger threatening the village that kept our ancestors alert and alive. Given the evolutionary success of being able to imagine things you couldn't actually sense directly, it's not hard to see how that became, "There must be someone like us, but greater than us, who we can't see but does these things we don't understand". As we've matured, we've used the curious parts of our imaginations to help us understand, and in the last few centuries we've confirmed that every explanation has its foundations in a very real, very rational world that doesn't require supernatural behavior. But our imaginations continue to insist that there must be more that we can't see yet. And for some, you're absolutely right, it's a comforting blanket that does no harm and a lot of good. It really shouldn't be hard to understand why many people are afraid. And understanding this is crucial, imo, because incredulity is a passive and fallacious argument, and won't help with the main problem, making sure a group's beliefs don't become violent with respect to those outside the group. Ignorance is almost always the foundation that agendas are built upon.