Greg Boyles

The biggest volcanic explosions are far in excess of the explosions that even our most powerful nuclear weapons can produce. They would make negligeable difference to the enormous pressures beneath such volcanos that produce such super volcanic erruptions.

Do you prefer a Josef Rudolf Mengele type approach to regulation of the medical profession?????

Straw man argument. If it works for the medical profession then there is no reason to think that it couldn't work for science in general. Applied medical research - new surgical techniques and drugs - is already heavily regulated and this regulation is responsible for high western medical standards. But there is no shortage of new surgical techniques and drugs etc.

Well for example, you can certainly reasonably deduce that a scientist working for the military in developing laser wepaons is more is quite likely to cause wider harm to humanity than a scientist simply using a lazer to measure the distance to the moon. The retraining hand would be on the shoulder of the former but not the latter. As for carcinogens......I assume you are refering to drugs. That is largely taken care of by medical regulatory bodies. Scientists have to prove their new drugs are not harmful in any way before they can even get them to medical trials.

What is the difference between an atomic explosion and a volcanic erruption? In addition the surrounding land would be contaminated with fallout which would mean future generations of humans could not benefit from the rich new soils that eventually result.

In his series "Cosmos" Carl Sagan described the collision of galaxies as being like bullets passing through a swarm of bees. Interstellardistances are so vast that collisions between stars would be rare events in galactic collisions.

If you wish to impose DDT on africans then perhaps should should also educate them enough to make an informed choice about whether thay wish to accept it or not. I suspect, if they were adequately educated on the chemistry of DDT, then most of them would reject your imposition, as have the vast majority of westerners, and stick with mosquito netting and windows screens! Yes! Knee jerk reactions like spraying DDT on the houses of people completely ignorant of the long term and wider dangers of it!

Good! Cop it on the chin but return a right hook! My understanding is that the issue is whether or not NH3 is a strong enough ligand to break the Ag2S bonds rather than whether or not (Ag(NH3)2)2S is soluble. I would supect that the species in solution would be Ag(NH3)2OH rather than the former. I would also assume that the S would largely volatilise off as H2S. There are ammonium ions in ammonia solution and ammonium ions are a weak acid.

As I have previously said the focus should be on development of specific technologies rather than on pure research. E.G. A restraining hand on the shoulder of scientists who seek to develop ways to produce industrial quantities of DDT rather than on scientists detailing the chemcial properties of DDT. Or on scientists seeking to develop a death ray rather than on scientists who are simply developing lasers in general. Or on scientists who seek to increase food production further rather than developing better contrceptives. That's the way it generally works for medical research. Research on the causes of cancer and diabetes etc is generally unrestricted apart from animal ethics and budgetry contraints. But develkopment a testing of new drugs or surgical techniques is subject to strict oversight. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Scientists with tunnel vision concerning increasing food yields, preventing third world deaths and finding new ways to kill insects are a signficant part of our current global problems - they are not and will never be part of the solution. They will acheive little more than bringing humanity to the brink of the inevitable crash of human civilisation (detailed in my post titled "Limits to growth" from Scientific American in "Earth Sciences") a little faster.

What you see as callous, I see as facing reality. You cannot save them all swansont. And, to coin a phrase from star wars, the more your tighten your grip (malaria, starvation,......) the more africans that will slip through your fingers into death in the long term. We have been through this sort of mentality through the previous decades. Live aid, band aid, Bob Geldoff, end to poverty,............ After all this effort over several decades there are even more africans living in poverty and periodically dieing from starvation. Why because people like this only ever reach for short term quick fixes (and personal kudos) rather than addressing the more difficult underlying structural problems. If we don't learn from history we are doomed to endlessly repeat it.

What is the cost of treating chronic diseases like diabetes and cancer over half a lifetime of multiple generations compared to treating a malaria at present?????? And if you eliminate malaria then are you going to reduce fertility of africans in comepensation. If you don't then future generations are likely to die from malnutrition and other effects of over population. What will it then cost in emergency aid over decades to keep all the extra people alive? What about the cost of damaged local ecosystems? What about the cost of mosquitos becoming resistant to DDT? You are suffering from tunnel vision on this issue swansont. Human suffering due to malaria etc is a symptom of structural problems with African society, primarily over popoulation and corruption. We need to stop focusing on the symptoms and start focusing on the structural problems. As I said, preservation of individual lives should not come at wider and long term costs to future generations and to the environment they will have to live in. If it means that a proportion of current Africans have to continue dieing from malaria for the forseeable future then so be it. But there is a simple and safer solution for malaria in mosquito nets and windows screens. DDT is not an acceptible answer for the vast majority of westerners.

I meant exposure from touching the sprayed surface and inhaling the volatilised ddt, not literally spraying it on your skin. Any way you are nit picking about wording rather than addressing the point I made. You are happy to have ddt imposed upon africans to prevent them getting malaria and yet you wouldn't use it in your own house. That is double standards.

You say water will not dissolve AgS. But you are talking absolutes which is not the case in chemistry. That is the same mistake I made at the beginning of this argument. Ag2S is soluble in water albeit to an extremely small extent. And solubility in water will be increased by temperature, albeit still very low. Therefore I still remain interested to what extent heat and high ammonia concentration would have on Ag2S in ammonia, albeit probably still low. If ammonia is a weaker ligand than water then you would have a point. But is it? I don't think it is. Water is not capable of dissolving copper hydroxide but ammonia is. That implies than ammonia is a stronger ligand than water. But enough to make a noticeable difference to a thin film of tarnish on Ag (under the influence of heat and high concentration)?

This is where a global regulatory body for scientific research and scientists is needed in my opinion. We should be reflecting carefully on whether or not increasing food supplies is a wise strategy for dealing with the looming global food crisis. Perhaps we would be better served to focus our efforts on addressing the underlying structural problem of to many people and to much consumption, by developing more effective and cheaper contraceptives and particularly a male contraceptive (other than condoms that is).Get all scientists singing from the same hym book rather than individual running around pursuing their own pet projectes and careers.

Regardless the ability of ammonia to break those bonds, or not, is not determined by the solubility of Ag2S in water.

No not a strawman because you have jumped to an incorrect conclusion. I did not say to spray ddt on yourself, I said spray it all over the house that you and your hypothetical children occupy. So you wouldn't use it yourself but it is good enough for peasant africans......says a lot about the attitudes of people who advocate this. I do not agree that insecticides like DDT should be used under any circumstances regardless of loss of life due to malaria. I do not agree with the notion preservation of life at any wider cost. If pyrethrin and aerogade are not practical in Africa then free mosquito nets will have to suffice. I noted that as I was reading and altered my statement to something like 'not completely bidegradable. But you should also take note that the break down products of DDT are apparently as toxic as the original compound. I disagree with this. I think not taking a breath or two and more often reflecting on whether a particular technology should be developed is faciliating the continued culture of applying short term band aid solutions rather than addressing the underlying structural problems of western civilisation. If technological solutions were not made so readily available by scientists I believe that politicians and business would be a great deal more cautious with their decision making and we would have fewer big global problems in the future.

New Scientist, 7 January 2012 Forty years ago, a highly controversial study warned that we had to curb growth or risk global collapse. Does the prediction still hold, asks Debora MacKenzie AT THE beginning of the 1970s, a group of young scientists set out to explore our future. Their findings shook a generation and may be even more relevant than ever today. The question the group set out to answer was: what would happen if the world's population and industry continued to grow rapidly? Could growth continue indefinitely or would we start to hit limits at some point? In those days, few believed that there were any limits to growth – some economists still don't. Even those who accepted that on a finite planet there must be some limits usually assumed that growth would merely level off as we approached them. http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21328462.100-boom-and-doom-revisiting-prophecies-of-collapse.html

If you put tarnished silver in liquid ammonia then the solubility of Ag2S in water is totally irrelevant to whether or not the ammonia is capable of breaking the bonds in Ag2S. Assuming complex ions can form in non-aqueous solutions.......either way it should get across the point I am/was trying to make. However I will concede that the solubility of Ag2S in water is probably not totally irrelevant for aqueous ammonia and that this statement of mine was an over statement. Some interesting facts I have learned along the way....... Silver can be tarnished through contact with organic sulfur containing compounds such as latex and perhaps sweat from hands, I guess these break down to release tiny amounts of H2S and over a long period...... Have also noticed a number of sources stating that pure silver is less prone to tarnishing than stirling silver, I guess because the copper is more reactive than the silver. That would mean that ammonia is more effective on stirling silver than it is on pure silver. And chemistoftheelements, would you be in a position to repeat your experiments with stirling silver and pure silver and with warmed 0.88M ammonia in a sealed container? I am interested to know if it would really make any noticeable difference to dissolving Ag2S tarnish. I don't have any silverware or silver wire on hand although I could make myself a small amount of 0.88M ammonia. Used to make it in my younger days for the purpose of making touch powder and I still have the flasks and stoppers etc.

Even better, thanks again.

I do not agree with you or the scientists involved that DDT can be used safely. Reagrdless of whether it is sprayed on crops or sprayed on huts it is still a toxin that does not totally biodegradable and accumulates in the ecosystem ultimately effecting the health of everyone else on the planet. Preserving the lives of Africans does not trump the health of everyone else on the planet and of the global ecosystem itself. Nor do the career prospects and humanitarian ideals of scientists and aid workers involved with such foolish schemes. Would you use DDT in your own house, on yourself and on your own children???? It has been linked to diabetes and to cancer for example. If you want to help those africans then give them a free supply of aerogard or pyrethrin and mosquito nets. This philosophy of some scientists and aid workers of preserving life at ANY cost is becoming a danger to the entire planet, the Homo sapiens and all other species that currently live on this planet. And indeed it is often detrimental to the individuals themselves and, in the long term, their sociesties. As for Thalidomide, presumeably it is totally biodredable and can be used safely in a medical context hence in this case I would agree that there not be a total prohibition on it. Medical regulatory bodies have no doubt become stricter on drug trials since the thalidomide disaster, hence such a disaster is less likely to be repeated. As I have previously said, medical regulation is not perfect but it has never the less substantially raised medical standards in the west over all. The same could be true of a more generalised regulatory body for wider science.

Never found the former on websites but it would be handy if I could find them. But the latter website seems rather useful. Thanks.

Logical fallacy? Is that how you dismiss an idea that you don't agree with? How is it a logical fallacy? Medicine would progress faster if experimentation on humans was allowed? An example of direction that science should not be permitted to travel in. Medical/drug regulation and standard are not perfect but they are considerably better than they would be if drug company scientists etc were unregulated. And drug companies are certainly accountable for %^&* ups if not the individual scientists. They generally get sued by the thousands of patients who are injured by their faulty products. I guess the scientists involved are indirectly accountable for these %^&* ups. If it is serious enough I guess the drug companies would sack them. If politicians and business people refuse to listen then scientists could and should withdraw their services. If all scientists had to be e member of a union like global regulatory body then they could be compelled to do so. As I have said they are in a position of superior knowledge and therefore higher moral obligation. "It's not my problem" type attitude is not acceptible for scientists in my opinion. You no doubt are aghast, like the rest of us, at negligent doctors being protected by subordinate hospital staff and administrators. I am aghast at scientists who put their careers ahead of wider obligations to their society. Skating on thin ice......well councils are often found accountible by courts these days for such things if they have failed to put up adequate warning signs. There is a big difference in legal obligations between a member of the general public being aware that the ice is thin and a person in a position of authority being aware that the ice is thin. I put it to you that scientists are in a position of authority due to their superior knowledge. Perhaps this sort of thing is a factor in why the general public in increasingly distrusting of science and scientists. "I think that the scientific community does a better job of policing itself against fraud than medical organizations do. But the kind of policing you want is impossible, because it requires knowledge that we, by the very nature of the job, don't have — you can't tell what you will find as the result of research. Which is why you do the research." I am primarily refering to applied science as opposed to pure research. It is one thing to discover DDT and detail its chemical properties noting that it cannot be borken down by any known living organisam. It is entirely another to then help chemical companies manufacture DDT to be sold as an insecticide without further research being done to determine what will happen to it in the global ecosystem once it is sprayed on a wide scale. "You are passing the buck. If politicians and businessmen are unethical, we should regulate them. They have the power. You are trying to place the burden of a group that doesn't have very much. " Scientists have some power to and are entirely capable of exercising it if they choose. IF they were members of a union like body then they could have all banded together and refused to develop means of producing DDT on an industrial scale. At present the companies just go to the next scientist if one refuses. That is what unions are all about - taking some of the power away from politicians and big business. Scientists faciliated the foolishness of politicians and business, concerning DDT, by developing means to produce it on an industrial scale. Therefore they share some of the blame! Galileo is a poor example. Knowing that the the earth goes around the sun is either neutral to the health of the global ecosystem on which we depend, so why should biggots be allowed to suppress such knowledge. But there is no question that a toxic chemical that cannot be broken down by any known organism is going to be detrimental to the global ecosystem and ultimately to human health. We need a global union like science body to determine such matters. I.E. By bringing multiple scientific disciplines together and spending a little more time on whether a particular technology should be developed and a little less time on how it can be developed. Changing the laws is my responsibility......not good enough! Scientific knowledge is nearly always ahead of the knowledge of law makers who are continually playing catch up with new technology. Either the scientists have to slow down and allow the law makers to keep pace or they have to start regulating themselves from the position of their superior knowledge.

Recently bought some DDR400 RAM from ebay - Kingston KTM-M50/1G. I tried it in two motherboards and found they would not boot with it. It took me a while to figure out the problem was with the RAM rather than the motherboards. After many days of googling KTM-M50/1G I eventually found a sale website that stated this particular RAM was specific to IBM work stations. The documentation for the motherboards does not give specific brands of RAM that are compatible with them. Has any body ever found a good tech website that details compatibility issues with various types and makes of RAM because I was unable to find one.

Not most likely but definitely. I believe some flat worms and clams have simple eye spots that do no more than detect light or shadow.

That is only a fairly recent phenomenum from what I heard today from a member of the British business community discussing business ethics in the wake of the GFC. Well naturally anyone or any group accused of not being accountable is going to deny it. In that way the scientific community is no different to business and finance community in the wake of the GFC. Accountability is usually imposed on such segments of the community mainly by those outside it, perhaps also by a minority within that community have have a wider conscience. The medical profession and research functions just fine and with high standards under such a regime and is not in any way curtailed. If medical research can function with strict over sight then there is no reason to believe that science in general cannot function equally as well also with higher standards. And even if scientific progress was slowed a little then that is not necessarily a bad thing given that scientific progress has contributed to leading us to global warming, peak fish and peak oil etc The fact is that human civilisation is at a precipice and the time of everyone being able to get away with the phrase "It's not my problem" is over. Everyone including the science community is MUST start taking responsibility for their part in this looming human catastrophe. It is time for individual scientific careers and prestige to take a back seat to some form of global science ethics. As gate keepers of the technology that enables unethical politicians and business people etc to serve their own narrow interests and $%&* up the planet in the process, the science community is in a potentially powerful position to do something about preserving planet Earth in a state suitable for habitation by future generations. The first step is to bring all scientists under some sort of global regulatory body similar to the medical organisations in individual countries.