Pangloss

Yeah I watched that interview and I thought it was a pretty astute question, and it thoroughly caught him off guard. So much so that it got me wondering if Stephanopoulos has it in for Edwards. Not that his branch of the Democratic party is any better, but at least his former employer voted for putting actions behind words. Where we'll be is that we'll have created the second Shi'a state. But the Sunnis won't let it go at that. I think it could become a major battleground in a larger Sunni-Shi'a conflict. Hm. I wonder why Israel isn't pressing us to pull out immediately.

Well, even if true, it doesn't negate the validity of the point being made. I think it just adds more depth to the problem. BTW, answering the claim that the media ignores a problem by insisting that there really isn't a conspiracy to ignore the problem is a logical fallacy of distraction. Just because there isn't a media conspiracy to ignore black-on-white crime doesn't mean there isn't a problem of black-on-white crime, or that it is underreported in the media. (Not that you were making either claim, BhavinB, I'm just pointing it out for the sake of discussion.)

Which really makes terraforming a lot more complex, doesn't it? You can build it up but it'll just get whisked away again. Though I suppose if you have the technology to build it up then you probably have the technology to overcome the leakage.

Actually I'm not sure about that bit regarding losing atmosphere to low gravity. I think it's generally believed that it once had a much thicker atmosphere, but lost it due to the fact that it lost its electromagnetic field. (Earth's atmosphere would be washed away too, in spite of its higher gravitic field, were it not for the electromagnetic shock wave that proceeds it in its orbital push against solar wind.) I'm just dimly recalling this, so someone please correct me if I'm wrong.

The latest on this is that the return vehicle has been lost in the mountains somewhere. They're still searching for it. So now all the "beam me up" jokes are making a comeback. "Scotty stranded on planet and in need of a rescue", etc. I don't think that's really what he wanted, is it? Some things just bear a little more forethought.

The dark underbelly of politically correct legislation of morality. I doubt you'll see many replies on this, Haezed. The people who agree with you won't have anything to add, and those embarassed by the reality of their opinions won't have the temerity to defend themselves.

I think you're probably right about all of that. Not to change the subject, but I've wondered many times over the years how the black leadership might have turned out differently were it not for the tragedy in Memphis. I grew up in Atlanta between 1965 and 1985, a time and place where people who "were part of the civil rights movement" were more common than streets named "Peachtree" on a north Georgia road map. I can tell you from that experience that there is something of a bipolar split in the variety of former civil rights leaders who came out of that era -- those who became demagogues and those who did not. You almost never hear about the latter variety, but it's always seemed to me that MLK was of the non-demagogic type (though I admit that's an irony). The thing I think a lot of people fail to understand about the American civil rights movement is that it *needed* demagoguery. Would have failed without it! Most black people at that time were not willing to stand up a fight for "civil rights". THAT aspect of the movement was mainly in the province of well-to-do blacks, college students, and activists. Working blacks had every-day problems to deal with like getting that next paycheck and paying for the food needed to feed the kids, which almost certainly depended on not antagonizing some rich white man. The only way to bring THOSE people on board was to sell them on the idea that they were better off economically by enrolling in the movement. But that method of enrollment of the common man carried a price. The demagogic side of the black leadership has never understood that price, and doesn't care a whit about it. The non-demagogic side understands it very well, but it is tragically under-represented. Examples might be found in John Lewis, MLK's right-hand-man Ralph Abernathy (who actually supported Ronald Reagan for President), or Hosea Williams (who always seemed more interested in feeding the poor with FOOD rather than flowery rhetoric). Mind you, all of them were outspoken champions of civil rights! But there is a distinct difference between their actions and the ambulance-chasing tactics of the likes of Sharpton and Jackson. I've no real evidence of this, but I've always suspected that MLK today would be outraged and appalled at black culture, much in the same way as Bill Cosby. Oh I think he would have been opposed to the war in Iraq, but I think he would have much more in common with the moderate black leadership in this country than with the demagogues like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson.

I'm too sexy for this thread.

I don't know, but I can tell you that with most content ratings there is a cumulative effect on the earned rating. The level of objection to the content is a factor, but so is the amount of objectionable content. How this works specifically with electronic games I'm not sure. This often impacts on films in a similar way, so you'll hear about directors clipping a few seconds off an objectionable scene, getting it checked by the MPAA, then having to remove a few more seconds, get it checked again, etc.

I suspect humor. Kinda like saying "!@#%*@(" instead of cursing. (shrug)

Nonsense. It's not okay to make biggoted comments about people who are in public life. And I don't think it would have been accepted if the target of Imus' comment had been Oprah Winfrey instead of the Rutgers women's basketball team.

Well I think what he is is a demogogue. He's about rousing the rabble. My two bits anyway.

Interesting point about meteor shields. Could that point possibly be offset by setting up a lunar colony on the side of the moon that faces the Earth? I know the near side can still be hit, but I believe the odds are far lower, right? Another interesting point about air pressure. Sealing out a toxic atmosphere is probably less of an engineering challenge than sealing in an atmosphere against a virtual vacuum. I guess the question there would be whether the difference is worth the lifting/transport cost.

I agree that it's more than just the media involved, but there's clearly a linkage between outrage in certain groups of people and the media, and it's all wrapped up with political correctness. I agree that Imus became a frenzy because certain groups were outraged at what he said, and they prompted the media to pull the trigger on the story. The groups that are outraged by Sharpton are considered less relevent by the media, therefore the frenzy is not created. There are exceptions, but it typically takes a far more eggregious example on the politically correct side before a frenzy is created, and when one is, its ramifications are far less serious for the offender. A good example might be Jesse Jackson's "hymie town" incident. He certainly isn't paying for that one anymore, and it's every bit as serious as what Imus did. Nor is Sharpton still paying for Tawana Brawley.

Actually I believe the moon does have a gravitationally-bound atmosphere. It's just a really trivial one. But then the same could be said about Mars. Does the Martian atmosphere have any practical value for potential settlers at all? Surely teraforming is a distant dream, and we can probably ship water to the moon faster than you can pull it out of the Martian atmosphere. (But maybe not cheaper.) The point about gravity might have some merit. There is, of course, something to be said about the aerobraking value of the Martian atmosphere (the Moon's is too thin for such, I assume). But then you don't really need a braking effect for lunar landing, since you can get there at a relatively low velocity (in a quite reasonable amount of time).

That is an incorrect interpretation of what Al Sharpton said, not for the least of which because it required that you remove one of the key words he used. It ain't even debatable, IMO. Simply wrong. I agree with this view, but I also think ParanoiA is right in pointing out the hypocrisy. On this you and I will clearly not agree, because IMO you've put the cart before the horse. There's no story here because the news media decided not to create one.

Well just to get back to the spirit of the OP, why does Mars seem to have more colonization appeal than the Moon? All of the reasons I've seen stated above for preferring Mars over Venus would seem to apply to an even greater degree when it comes to the Moon, and yet it would seem to be a far less popular idea than colonizing Mars. Is it just a matter of romantic appeal?

So I'm curious what our British friends think Blair's legacy will be. Will he be listed in the history books as something other than George Bush's crony?

This thread has taken quite an amusing turn.

Right on. Damn those Jews anyway.

Bad ballots in Scotland, eh? Did they have a problem with hanging cads?

Just to add a little more meat to the discussion, what do you all think about their decision to not make it a wiki, but instead focus on academic integrity? Doesn't that kinda make sense in a situation like this? You can kinda see where an open wiki approach might be a temptation because of the distribution of work, but the that approach would surely undermine academic integrity. In a sense it's almost as if we're building a two-tiered approach to information on the Web. Because there's no particular reason why someone couldn't copy whatever's in the EOL for, say, the Lemur, and place it in the Lemur article in the Wikipedia. People could then add information there that's of a more cultural nature, like instances of Lemurs in pop culture, music videos, etc -- the kind of stuff that a scientist writing an academic article on Lemurs would ignore. That two-tiers-of-information aspect is intriguing to me.

Interesting project that's been underway for about a year, intended to take about ten years, which will eventually catalog 1.8 million species. It's not a wiki -- only qualified scientists will participate, and it's intended as an authoritative academic resource, but it's also intended to be friendly/easy to use, with lots of pictures, etc. Article about it here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6638017.stm Actual web site is here: http://www.eol.org/

IMO it has more to do with current media focus than celebrities. But I don't think there's any question there's been a sea change on public opinion with this subject over the last year. I think it started with the sudden trend to blame natural disasters on GW that reached its pinacle with Hurricane Katrina. There's still no direct causal relationship between GW and hurricanes (though there are some interesting hints of a link, e.g. gul water temps, el nino behaviors, etc), but the media has practically declared the linkage to be direct and factual. So every single natural disaster is now blamed directly on global warming, as well as any kind of extreme daily temperatures, both hot AND cold. It's pretty much the same deal as Iraq. You trumpet something loud and long enough, and people will not only form an opinion about it, but it'll be exactly the opinion you wanted it to be. Surprise!

This thread has been pruned. We have a place for debating the more serious side of this: http://www.scienceforums.net/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=59 Thanks.