SH3RL0CK

My guess is because humans are very poorly adapted to survive in anything but a very mild climate. We would all die from hypothermia (without clothes, houses, and fire) when the temperature drops below a certain point, perhaps 10C. We would die from carnivores without advanced weaponry such as the club, spear, and fire. We could very easily die from hunger without the ability to grow food via agriculture, even hunter-gatherer cultures try modify the environment to suit their food needs, and so on. We want to change the world because we must to survive in all but perhaps a few places on earth. That, or possibly Its probably one or the other Why would you assume evolution has a goal? Evolution is simply change over time with the better adapted surviving. The changes to our homoerectus - like ancestor enabled us to survive by modifying our local environment via technology rather than physical modifications to our bodies.

Well perhaps it is still needed. But if the stimulus were creating jobs and since we have spent 25% of it which is a lot of money, why has the unemployment rate has greatly increased (from 7% to 10%, IIRC) at the same time? I suppose it could be said that the unemployment would be much worse had this not been done... I'm just skeptical and wonder if we have been robbed by our congressmen... Both "we don't have it" and "we don't need to spend it" can be true statements. And if we don't have it, it becomes especially difficult to justify spending it on stuff we do not need.

Well, if they had already spent it they couldn't re-allocate it. Why is it no one has thought about NOT spending it at all? Obviously it isn't needed for stimulus if it hasn't yet been spent. This is one of the problems with government and with bureaucracy in general. They will spend all the money available, regardless of the actual need and regardless of what they have to do in order to spend it all. Every. Single. Penny.

Three of a kind...don't forget the original poster

My sentiments exactly...I thought the whole thing started off bad, until I saw it "being improved".

A thought I had for this - is it possible to change the air into something less electrically conductive (refridgerant?)? If the air were replaced with a less conductive gas, it might be possible to squelch the arc. Though, I'm not sure how you would then be able to breathe...

So then, he only needs to find 32 republicans who give to charity, give blood, are organ donors or have done some similar thing and he has proven his point as far as you are concerned? That sounds rather trivial to do. How about a more general approach: http://philanthropy.com/free/articles/v19/i04/04001101.htm Point proven?

What he said was: Which, in context, I read as an opinion. Which he is not obligated to support. And in any event, he could name every Republican senator and representative because he could certainly find at least some evidence they care about people. Perhaps some of them have donated to charities. Maybe some of them have given blood. I'll bet some are organ donors too... But again to my point to you: What evidence of the motivation of a politican is even possible? Or is it now acceptable to stereotype an entire class of people (Republicans)?

How is it at all possible to discern the motivations of anyone? It was claimed that there are some Republicans who care about serving the people. Syntho-sis cannot possibly factually back up his statement. However, he could have listed all republicans and you would have been unable to prove in every case they do not care. I think it would be more constructive if we start by defining what evidence of motivation would be acceptable. And then we have to decide how to deal with mixed motivations. If a selfish act also helps the public, how is this to be weighed?

We also should keep in mind this e-mail is probably biased and in fact may not be factual. Consider the statement "in his [Durbin] desperation to get something, he's [Durbin] given on most everything" from a "wish list". Somehow, I think Senator Durbin would recall the situation and the conversations differently. Likewise, I have to take the statements attributed to Sen. Kyl with a grain of salt. If given the chance, Kyl would also probably state his viewpoint differently.

Maybe he did, but its just not recorded in the e-mail. I'm not a fan or either political party either. And yes, I agree stupidity seems a fairly common trait in our politicians. The only other point I'd like to bring up is that if someone is getting a deal, doesn't that mean someone else is paying for it? Depending on the specifics (which we don't have because we do not have the full context of this e-mail), that alone might be enough for someone else to try to block it. Is the taxpayer going to be paying the difference between the original and the modified mortgage? Or is this going to be the bank customer in the form of higher fees, lower interest rates on savings and interest rates on loans? How do you feel about paying for someone else? Or is this going to be the consumer in the form of higher inflation? Someone is going to be forced to pay for this difference, probably in a way that isn't readily discerned (i.e. our national debt, or inflation). Maybe this payment is worthwhile by preventing a worldwide financial collapse, and maybe it is a scam transfering wealth from those who save it to those who squander it. But I don't know which is the case.

Yes. Really. There isn't enough information here to definitively say anything. People are reading their own political views in statements where nothing definite is said. See for example This could mean: Kyl finally sees the errors of the past and wants to establish regulations to prevent the abuses. The "and then" might have been a transition misinterpreted by whoever was discussing this issue with him. or Kyl thinks Durbins proposal (whatever that was at this specific time) will come back and bite the banks. If so, he isn't going to help them out of a problem they created themselves. They got what they wanted after all. or Kyl really, really does not like Durbin. or Kyl is playing politics, just as is Durbin. or any number of possible scenarios. Also, see for example It is in the banks best interests to maintain as good of a relationship as is possible with as many senators as possible. And apparently having a great relationship with a senator (Kyl), it is probably not a good idea to throw that away over a single issue, even one as important as was apparently going on here. While perhaps partisan loyalty is involved, it isn't at all definitive. Certainly not, in my opinion, enough to justify a statement like as I can see a logic behind some loyalty to Kyl with regards to what is best for the bank as I've described above. And what is the best for the country overall depends on a lot of subjective things, and shouldn't necessarily be the concern of a bank or banking association. Really hard to say without sufficient context. My belief is this is all politics. But again, I don't see any side particularly clean or especially dirty here.

I don't read the e-mail that way at all. Looks to me like the bankers trying to determine which party will give them the most. Who to stick with, the democrats promising everything now or the republicans who actually delivered everything in the past? Clearly a difficult choice for the banks. I think the best summary of their (the banks) motivations is the statement that Politics as usual, but I don't see any side particularly clean nor especially dirty here.

???? Video did not work. However, the e-mail itself states that the industry leaders may be willing to "alienate the Republican leadership" to acheive their goals. How then, are these Republicans? Looks more like lobbying and politics as usual to me. If you are going to call out Republicans for playing politics, then do so for the Democrats as well. See for example the statement in the e-mail itself "they gave Durbin a wish list a while back...in his desperation to get something, he's given on most everything" seems applicable to both Democrats and Republicans to me. And espcially applicable to the bankers.

I fail to see how this could be a weapon of mass destruction, please elaborate if you have anything specific to collaborate this. Cosmic rays routinely hit the earth at energies many orders of magnitude greater than the energies from the LHC, and there are no problems from these. The LHC is buried deep underground, there is simply no way for any particles or energy from the LHC to be focused anywhere except the specific location of the LHC. People who are not standing within the LHC (and access to it is, I'm sure, restricted), then are safe from the radiation and particles generated by it. Frankly, there is no possibility of harm from the LHC.

A recent article suggested we essentially revert back to the "outhouses" of yesterday. http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20091207/us_time/08599194576400 While I agree that these are more energy efficient (by far), the article seems to lack mention of any drawbacks. I'm thinking if this goes into wide use, someone will eventually get sick from the bacteria. Thoughts?

I'm a bit confused as to why a science class would be told to write fiction (that task should be left for a literature class). If you wrote one, would the teacher accept a factual news report?

With your assumption the distance is the same (if I understand you correctly), then my answer is you will be dryer when running because you will get inside more quickly than if you walked. Assuming an equal time in the rain, running will get you wetter because instead of the rain only falling straight down on your head and shoulders, the raindrops will contact the front part of your body (chest, stomach, etc.) due to the forward motion in addition to the raindrops falling on your head and shoulders.

Really? I doubt it, this violates the law of conservation of energy. Couldn't I simply hook two of these together, back to back, and create energy out of nothing? The decrease on one end of a heat exchanger is going to be equal to the increase on the other end. Where one side has the temperature decreasing, the other side must have the temperature increasing by an equal amount of heat energy. You should look at the law of conservation of energy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_conservation_of_energy

Ok. lets call the 60K part your heat sink. How exactly do you get 60K without using a lot of energy? Haven't you just spend a very considerable amount of energy (in an inefficient process, b.t.w.) to get a heat sink? And now it is proposed that bringing this heat sink up to 273K is going to produce more energy than it took (in an inefficient process, b.t.w.) to create it in the first place? I think you really need to look at the whole picture here, not just a small part...

Indeed, there are geothermal heat pumps which create energy. But as previously and repeatedly stated by others, where is your heat sink? There is none. You cannot generate electricity without moving the heat somehow to harness the temperature difference. Of course you could consume electricity by shuffling heat around and making a temperature difference, but that isn't what has been claimed and isn't newsworthy at all. There are many, many various other problems with this idea. Helium is almost the worst possible choice (efficiency wise) for a refrigerant. The solar power is clearly insufficient. The apparatus inserts various inefficient processes for no apparent reason. And on and on... I'm starting to believe some of the proponents of this idea here are simply trolling...

You cannot bypass the laws of physics, specifically the law of conservation of energy. So, no, it is not even theoretically possible to do this as has already been mathematically shown...the solar energy present isn't sufficient.

Thanks for this information, its quite impressive (if this can be validated by independent researchers). It is still a very big jump from a specific word or picture to being able to determine exactly how someone is adjusting an intrincate set of beliefs regarding a very complex issue such as the death penalty within their brain, so I'm still not accepting the findings as conclusive, but perhaps compelling isn't such a wrong choice of words. As technology improves who knows what may eventually become possible?

I would not put much stock into their inferences regarding how brain activity correlates to thought patterns. As I understand it, the correlation of brain activity to specific thoughts, beliefs, ideas, etc. is very, very,very poorly understood (I'm not an expert, please correct me if I am wrong here, but I don't think I am). As quoted , the author (?) does not imply the evidence is conclusive. And I might even argue that the word "compelling" would be a poor choice of words as I don't personally find it all that compelling either. However, I do agree from personal anecdotal evidence that statements like and are probably true.

I am aware of numerous examples of "non-permanent" taxes that have been around so long, I'd say they are permanent. As one example, take a look at toll roads - the tolls were supposed to cease when the construction costs for the roads were paid, which in some cases has happened many times over but the tolls are still being collected (ok, not really a tax, but still wrong). I'm not aware of many examples "non-permanent" taxes which have actually expired. This deceit on the part of our politicians is why raising money via "non-permanent" taxes is now politically difficult, it not infeasible.