Re: Still here (Re: Br¡n: On Fracking and Earthquakes)
? From: Nick Arnett Sent: Sunday, September 18, 2011 11:02 AM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: Still here (Re: Br¡n: On Fracking and Earthquakes) I'm still here, of course. Recently joined NetBase as director of product management, so I'm busy getting up to speed. One of the data points NetBase has developed is that despite Twitter, Facebook, etc., the real conversation still happens, and is increasing, in forums, list servers, etc. Discussion tends to start in the new social media, but if it has any depth, it goes into venues where some depth is supported. I suppose if we really want to revive Brin-L, we need to have links to it appearing periodically in social media. Nick ___And of course I am still here ...somewhere Xponent Lost In Spacetime Maru rob http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Ben Bernanke, fearless leader
- Original Message - From: Nick Arnett nick.arn...@gmail.com To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Sunday, August 30, 2009 10:56 PM Subject: Re: Ben Bernanke, fearless leader On Sun, Aug 30, 2009 at 8:36 PM, John Williams jwilliams4...@gmail.comwrote: On Sun, Aug 30, 2009 at 7:53 PM, Doug Pensingerbrig...@zo.com wrote: How ironic is it that someone who claims to be such a libertarian is so adamant about restricting my rhetorical style! When did I claim to be a libertarian? Oh, come on. You espouse libertarian ideologies constantly, Mr. Keep the Government out of Everything, Please. Catch 60 Minutes tonight, talking about how deregulation in financial markets in 2000 essentially legalized betting on financial instruments, which had been illegal for most of the 20th century? That's what opened the doors to credit default swaps and other credit derivatives... the modern equivalent of Wall Street's bucket shops, which I hadn't known about until I heard this. What was a felony suddenly became legal, at the behest of Wall Street, and it was justified by the very arguments you make here - government regulation, intervention is bad, leave the market alone, they're all grown-ups and the market will fix any problems that come up. And look what happened instead - wild betting on mortgages, so confusing and byzantine that nobody knows what any of it really is worth. And this is a good? This federal deregulation actually stopped the states from enforcing anti-gambling and anti-bucket shop laws, passed after the crash of '07, in the financial markets. You'd think that would have been a strong clue that this would go badly. Now we know. Yet some still insist that we should not regulate these things. Oy. I find it humorous that those who believe in an invisible hand might ridicule the belief in an invisible pink unicorn. xponent A Smorgasbord Of Delicious Ironies Maru rob ___ http://mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Ben Bernanke, fearless leader
- Original Message - From: John Williams jwilliams4...@gmail.com To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Tuesday, August 25, 2009 11:10 AM Subject: Re: Ben Bernanke, fearless leader With the burning building, it is extremely unlikely that a horde of people will individually, or as a group, study the situation, form plans each using their own specialized knowledge of the situation, and proceed to solve the problem of the burning building, a little bit at a time. Sounds a lot like what firemen do for a living. H.maybe exactly what firemen do for a living. But in a large economy like in the US, this is exactly what has been happening every day, for decades. Economic predictions have a way of changing conditions so that the prediction never occurs or is minimalized. xponent Hurricane Warnings Maru rob ___ http://mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: The Role of Government in a Libertarian Free Market
- Original Message - From: John Williams jwilliams4...@gmail.com To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Monday, August 17, 2009 10:02 PM Subject: Re: The Role of Government in a Libertarian Free Market On Mon, Aug 17, 2009 at 7:53 PM, Rceebergerrceeber...@comcast.net wrote: On 8/17/2009 9:12:11 PM, John Williams (jwilliams4...@gmail.com) wrote: On Mon, Aug 17, 2009 at 7:01 PM, Rceebergerrceeber...@comcast.net wrote: On 8/17/2009 8:48:30 PM, John Williams (jwilliams4...@gmail.com) wrote: On Mon, Aug 17, 2009 at 6:38 PM, Rceebergerrceeber...@comcast.net wrote: Your statement reads quite humorously.G That's great! Apparently there is a fine line between humorous and rude and sincere. Feel free to give my posts the benefit of the doubt... Oh, you have received that particular benefit in spades. Still here, right? Are you implying that you would kill file me if you did not give my posts the benefit of the doubt? No. If certainty was high that you were just a troll you would be kicked from the list. Perhaps there was a misunderstanding. I meant that you might give my posts the benefit of the doubt -- singular you. Rceeberger, that is. For clarity: Robert Seeberger But no, I do not give you the benefit of the doubt. I think I have you pegged as exactly the kind of intentionally obtuse person you appear to be. Or did you mean that you have access to the subscriber list and you, personally, would have removed my name if you did not give me the benefit of the doubt? No, when I say we in this context, I mean that we have in the past booted people from the list as a group in most cases. There being no one person in particular one can suck up to in order to avoid consequences, it behooves everyone to be generally inoffensive. A few people have been removed, a couple of them long term listees and one was a moderator here. We definitely are not queasy when it comes to pulling the pin. xponent Wide Borders Maru rob ___ http://mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: The Role of Government in a Libertarian Free Market
- Original Message - From: John Williams jwilliams4...@gmail.com To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Monday, August 17, 2009 10:19 PM Subject: Re: The Role of Government in a Libertarian Free Market On Mon, Aug 17, 2009 at 8:05 PM, Rceebergerrceeber...@comcast.net wrote: We are friends who have been with each other for many years. We can finish each others sentences. We are practically fucking married for crissakes. Brin-L and the Culture list are bicameral lobes of a humongous hive mind. We are gay telepaths whose thought balloons are filled with big pink fluffy gothic fonts and we are all laughing at your sloppy desk. Do you see people objecting to the We? No. I do not see myself objecting to we either. Just asking questions. Anyway, that did not answer my question about how many list subscribers there are, and how many are covered by the we. No one particular cares how many lurkers there are. Officially, they are our readers since that is what they do on this list. Occasionally one perks up and adds something to the discussion and on rare occasions someone will contact someone else offlist. But for the most part We are the entertainment and they are our beloved audience even though the star of the show appears only infrequently. Since no one is answering, I will jump to a conclusion. Apologies if it is unwarranted. It is. It seems to me that it is important to you to demonstrate to me that there are a number of people on this list who are like you and agree with you on most subjects and philosophies of life, and that I am not among that number. No, that is not important at all, because it is irrelevant to the subject at hand. When it comes to the life of this list, most of the longtimers can easily speak for the group because we share a great deal of common history. It is pretty much the same as using we when speaking for Americans even though Americans are very diverse there is still considerable commonality. Happens all the time on this list in both situations. As for you not being included in the we when any of us are responding to you, you are still quite new here, disagreeable, and prone to pushing buttons. We are trying to gently guide you away from culture shock and toward assimilation into the group in some way. Perhaps it will simplify future discussions for me to assure you that yes, I am aware of that, and I am not trying to join your clique, start my own clique, or compete with your clique in any way. I am just asking questions. We have no cliques. But we do have Jedi Mind Tricks: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yu_moia-oVI xponent Your Source For Pure Evil Maru rob ___ http://mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Google Operating System
- Original Message - From: Bruce Bostwick lihan161...@sbcglobal.net To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Thursday, July 09, 2009 8:37 PM Subject: Re: Google Operating System Sounds like you might know the right people to ask for a tour*. ;) (*one not involvng Space Center Houston..) That is about the only tour one can get at NASA these days. You have to be a VIP to get to see the MOCR or any of the good stuff that just anyone could see back in the early 90s. But you do get to see Bldg 9 where I did a good bit of work once upon a time. (That's the building with the shuttle mockups and such.) I believe ... that if life gives you lemons, you should make lemonade. And try to find somebody who's life gives them vodka, and have a party. -- Ron White I grew up just a few miles from where Ron White grew up. Never met him though. A guy I used to work with went to school with Bill Hicks, may his soul rest in peace. xponent The Heat Death Of Yours Truly Maru rob ___ http://mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: In despair for the state of SF
- Original Message - From: Warren Ockrassa war...@nightwares.com To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Saturday, July 04, 2009 3:19 AM Subject: In despair for the state of SF A week or so back I finished _Hidden Empire_, the first book in Kevin J. Anderson's Saga of Seven Suns: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saga_of_Seven_Suns I discovered this one late -- the series is out now in pulp, and I was unaware of it prior to that. I have some things I just need to vent. [spoilers -- ha, as if] What an unbelievable turd. While it's not unusual for a novelist to foreshadow, Anderson basically forecudgeled. His aliens are disinteresting in the extreme; the only marginally noteworthy society was the Green Priests and their symbiosis with their worldforest, and they were human. The obtuseness of his characters and societies is unforgivable. When you compress the core of a gas giant and turn it into a star, notice what appear to be diamondlike nodules shooting out from the new sun, and then see diamondlike ships attacking cloud-harvesters on other gas giants, you have to be a cretin of genuinely universal proportions to not understand what happened. Yet that's exactly what occurs: No one knows why the hydrogues are attacking cloud harvesters! The alien allies of Earth are anthropomorphic and capable of interbreeding with humans -- oh come on -- and have a history recitation that's millennia deep. Their leader even knows about the hydrogues, though it's a buried secret, yet he still manages somehow to be stunned and ignorant of their attacks, sources, reasoning, etc. Anderson has a husband/wife team of xenoarchaeologists who've uncovered both the wormhole tech used to create suns of gas giants, and teleportation tech used by a long-dead race called the Klikiss. Yup, just the two of them. Not a team, no student support, just a couple of kooks digging up fossil civilizations. And they reactivate a teleport panel using, essentially, camp-light batteries. Those must be some damn impressive batteries. One can only assume they're radically unlike the Li-ion cells in iPhones. And as for the cloud harvesters -- well, early in the narrative we have a captain of one of these things STEPPING OUTSIDE ONTO AN OBSERVATION DECK without breathing apparatus as his skymine sucks up free hydrogen. They even keep doves. Outside. In the atmosphere of the gas giant. While harvesting hydrogen. Almost every page contains a slap to the face of science and SF; it's not even fantasy. It's just a childish notion of magical settings placed for the convenience of plot and story, without any effort made to actually consider what's feasible and what is not. But what tweaked me most was the interview section at the end of the book, where Anderson says he wanted to write a saga that included everything he claims to love about SF. He mentions _Dune_ particularly -- no surprise since he worked with Brian Herbert on continuing Frank Herbert's exploration of that storyline. The only thing I can conclude is that Anderson never understood what Herbert accomplished with _Dune_, and more generally, he doesn't understand SF at all -- least of all what makes a good SF story. Any decent editor in the genre would have suggested two things to him: Rethink. Redact. If this is the state SF is sliding into, particularly in the wake of the _Trek_ and _Transformers_ noise-machines, what the hell do we have left? Uh..why aren't you reading something good? xponent Matter Maru rob ___ http://mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Iran
- Original Message - From: Dan M dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Saturday, June 27, 2009 5:15 PM Subject: RE: Iran Reports from inside Iran say the Guard is split and mostly inactive. The Army is similarly. The police have been ineffective because they won't shoot their own countrymen. That is why most of the violence has been committed by Basiji and Arab imports (such as Hezbollah and some Afghan Taliban with possibly some Russians thrown in according to rumor) Many of the people committing violence are non-Farsi speakers and that is a solid indictment of the gravity of the situation. I'm curious to see where you stand now. I read your source, I think at this point we must both recognize that we both access several sources not noted in our discussion, and that the overall situation is much more complex than we are describing. I mention this because I believe we need to broaden the terms of the discussion a bit if either of us are to make arguments that give sensible predictions. I think most people would like to know what is coming from Iran over the next few years as recent events there could destabilize the local equilibrium. and realize that info coming from the country has been really cut backso there is a lot more speculation than fact in the outside world. Media info is cut back dramatically, but there is still a lot, a whole lot, of lower quality information sneaking out. There is still a fair bit of higher quality info coming from Iran, just not from media outlets. I know the Rand Corporation thinks the Revolutionary Guard is the big winner in this http://www.rand.org/commentary/2009/06/22/RC.html Interesting article, and probably accurate in some particulars, but I think it misses some crucial points. The group that has gained the greatest enhancement is the Basiji (your brownshirts). They have carried the load in the suppression (as semi-official and sanctioned enforcers) and (it seems to me) to be the locus of the increase in outright fascism in Iran. At this point Iran has to be defined as a fascist state on par with the WW2 fascists. This is a grave concern for reasons I think most of us already recognize. Even with reporters locked up in their hotel rooms, I would guess than marches of tens of thousands would be heard in the hotels. The types of reports that are getting out indicate that, if anything, the younger more militant aspects of the guard are increasing their power. (I'm thinking of the folks who captured a UK ship as an example). I would expect that the key to recognizing a nearby demonstration would not be the sounds made by protestors, but the sounds of gunfire from those supressing the protestors. Currently, I don't think there are any demonstrations that have 10K protesting, but there may occasionally still be 1K or 2K out on the street (max). Amedinajad is pretty much irrelevant ATM. He may be a figurehead for the younger more militant guard members and their brownshirt auxillary. Here we disagree. And what we disagree about is who Amadinajad fronts for. I contest that he is a schill for Khamenei. Further, I believe that the entire point of the clampdown is so that Khamenei can ensure that his son becomes the next Supreme Leader. Amadinajad is constitutionally prevented from serving as president after the upcoming term ends. I see three potential events coming. The constitution is changed to eradicate the term limits, the law is changed so that Prime Minister once again becomes the important position it once was with Amadinijad locked in, or Khamenei grooms someone equally pliable as the next president. It is really all about Khamenei and his scoin maintaining power. A national strike is being called (starting today). How that goes will determine the course and success of this revolt. From what I read, folks will have a hard time not working and not getting paid at all. With unemployment at 25%, and virtually all money coming from oil sales, and with everything government subsidized, the government has a lot of power. Again, I'll agree that we are working on minimal information, but I haven't been able to see a good source since Monday that indicates that the reform is gaining a foothold. If anything, its falling back. Agreed. Iranians seem to have had no stomach for a general strike. I think they would like to, but the reality on the ground is not conducive to an action that would entail incredible sacrifice and an obvious hardship on all. (I'm guessing it generally works this way in fascist countries?) It reminds me of the USSR in the '70s, when my friend from Moscow said folks became disillusioned. I don't doubt that in two decades, we could see reform. But, in between, the odds are that the younger more militant members of the Republican guard are the most likely to have
Re: Freeman Dyson on climate
- Original Message - From: Michael Harney dolp...@mikes3dgallery.com To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, March 27, 2009 9:40 AM Subject: Re: Freeman Dyson on climate Alberto Monteiro wrote: Rob wrote: Worth a read. Dyson is a Global Warming skeptic with an interesting take on the subject. A GW skeptic or an AGW skeptic? It would be hard to deny GW from the past 400 years with data. Alberto Monteiro Let me attempt to play Dyson here.G Based on what I read in the article, I would say that he doesn't dispute global warming. What he does dispute is the global impact that it would have. I can understand people saying we need more data, what I can't understand is that they insist we keep things status quo until we have conclusive data when the current disputed data we have predicts multiple global catastrophes. With stakes that high, it makes no sense to say that we should err against the side of caution. Dyson's first point in simple terms is that the data you speak of is computer models, and computer models are simply thatmodels. They are not beasts of a factual nature. They are projections within which some of the criteria are adjustable, giving rise to best case scenarios or worst case scenarios. Basing your actions and spending large portions of your wealth when the potential for inaccuracy is high is foolish. (Dan addressed a similar situation with Sagan and Nuclear Winter just a few days ago) Dyson's next point is that the developing nations burning of coal is a good thing, a very good thing. The improvements in the quality of life in China will save more lives than will be lost due to global warming in a couple of generations. Another point is that this is a fairly cool period in the history of earth and that most of the evolution of life occurred in warmer periods with higher levels of CO2. Global warming is not global but local with cool areas getting warmer but warmer areas not getting warmer. It reminds me of the chicken gun episode of Mythbusters where Adam, who is the one usually doing foolish things and getting hurt, got angry at Jamie for wanting to make a potentially unsafe pressure tank. Sure, there is a chance that nothing catastrophic will happen, but if something catastrophic does happen, people are going to die. Erring against caution in such a situation is just a big middle finger to all those people who are potentially in harms way. Its like saying We are willing to risk your lives and the lives of your family and friends to maintain our way of living. One of Dyson's main points is that global warming tends to get exaggerated. People of our generation or even the next one are extremely unlikely to die from the effects of global warming. Even a few generations down the road it is still unlikely unless they suddenly become very stupid. Who is going to stand still while the water rises over your head? People will simply adjust and they will have many years to do so. There won't be any sudden changes, it will all be very gradual and there will be a good number of benefits that come with a warmer climate. Like more food to eat for instance. *** OK, I'm finished playing Dyson. Someone else take a turn.G xponent Ignored Synergies Maru rob ___ http://mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Gord Again
- Original Message - From: William T Goodall w...@wtgab.demon.co.uk To: Brin-L brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Monday, February 02, 2009 7:57 AM Subject: Gord Again http://www.locusmag.com/2009/2008RecommendedReading.html This recommended reading list, published in Locus Magazine's February 2009 issue, is a consensus by Locus editors and reviewers -- Charles N. Brown, Gary K. Wolfe, Jonathan Strahan, Faren Miller, Russell Letson, Graham Sleight, Carolyn Cushman, Tim Pratt, Karen Haber, and Rich Horton -- with inputs from outside reviewers, other professionals, other lists, etc. Gord Sellar has two stories on the list, the Novella Wonjjang and the Madman of Pyongyang, Gord Sellar (Tesseracts Twelve) and the Novellette Lester Young and the Jupiter’s Moons’ Blues, Gord Sellar (Asimov’s 7/08) Congratulations Maru *** And now Gord is nominated for the Campbell Award which is given out along with the Hugos. http://www.thehugoawards.org/ xponent WooHoo Maru rob ___ http://mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Another kind of Iridium Flare
- Original Message - From: Matt Grimaldi matzeb...@yahoo.com To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Thursday, February 12, 2009 12:44 AM Subject: Another kind of Iridium Flare A satellite owned by the US company Iridium hit a defunct Russian satellite at high speed nearly 780km (485 miles) over Siberia on Tuesday, Nasa said. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7885051.stm And now: http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/02/15/texas.sky.debris/ Falling Debris xponent Cosmic Debris Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: SCOUTED: XKCD on Space Elevators
I read the subject line and thought: They have XKCD on Space Elevators? Awesome!!! xponent In-Flight Movie Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
- Original Message - From: dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, January 23, 2009 12:00 PM Subject: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? Since then, I've been seeing promises of competative electric cars. When gas prices were at $4.50/gallon, the premium for hybrids was within $1000 of being a wash. But, now that prices are back close to $1.50 (around here at leastbut when we were up near $4.50, I'd guess you were higher too) hybrid sales are falling like a rock. Aren't overall vehicle sales been falling like a rock? SUV/Truck sales have been getting a larger share of the pie of late, but as I understand it all sales are down and this is why *all* automakers are having troubles. xponent Question Of The Day Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
- Original Message - From: dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, January 23, 2009 4:39 PM Subject: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? Original Message: - From: xponentrob xponent...@comcast.net Date: Fri, 23 Jan 2009 15:56:08 -0600 To: brin-l@mccmedia.com Subject: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? - Original Message - From: dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, January 23, 2009 12:00 PM Subject: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? Since then, I've been seeing promises of competative electric cars. When gas prices were at $4.50/gallon, the premium for hybrids was within $1000 of being a wash. But, now that prices are back close to $1.50 (around here at leastbut when we were up near $4.50, I'd guess you were higher too) hybrid sales are falling like a rock. Aren't overall vehicle sales been falling like a rock? SUV/Truck sales have been getting a larger share of the pie of late, but as I understand it all sales are down and this is why *all* automakers are having troubles. But, hybrid sales are falling much faster. The latest comparison I got was through November, and (according to the eia), gas prices fell 20% from November to December. From http://www.greencarcongress.com/2008/04/r-l-polk-co-ana.html quote Sales of the market-leading Prius were down 48.3% to 8,660-its lowest sales month since January 2007. Camry Hybrid sales were off 57.5%, down to 2,174 units. That accounted for 8.6% of all Camry sales. Total Camry sales for the month were down 28.8%. Sales of the Highlander Hybrid were down 64.8% to 907 units, representing 11.5% of all Highlander models sold. Total Highlander sales were down 35.9% in the month. end quote So, as of November, they are dropping by about a factor of 2 more than the same gas powered models. Car sales are dropping, hybrid sales are dropping much faster. And, while I don't have the details available, indications are that the relative slide continues. In a couple of months, we'll see if there's a bottom. If not, hybrid sales will drop to the point where the sales become insignificant. *** So I'm wondering if the more expensive luxury versions of the comparable models are seeing similar falls in sales. Are people forgoing the bells and whistles also? xponent Further Investigations Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
- Original Message - From: xponentrob xponent...@comcast.net To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, January 23, 2009 4:49 PM Subject: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? *** So I'm wondering if the more expensive luxury versions of the comparable models are seeing similar falls in sales. Are people forgoing the bells and whistles also? To Answer my own question: http://www.voanews.com/english/2009-01-06-voa59.cfm Industry analyst Jesse Toprak says that while the slumping global economy has hurt all vehicle sales, trucks and sport utility vehicles outsold cars because of deep dealer discounts, lower gas prices and the fact that hybrids cost $3,000 to $5,000 more than conventional cars. It is a known that dealers have had a lot of overstock in trucks and SUVs from last summer. I would think that if the same discounts were available for the hybrids, sales would not have dropped off so steeply. xponent Da Moneez Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: The Hunt For Goldilocks
- Original Message - From: Charlie Bell char...@culturelist.org To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Thursday, January 22, 2009 6:53 PM Subject: Re: The Hunt For Goldilocks Hey Rob - if you're going to post links to articles, can you at least include a paragraph or so of each linked article to show what's interesting about it and maybe explain why I'd bother clicking it. I'm sure I'm not alone in being very reluctant to click naked links. Likewise, it's normally not necessary to post an entire article from elsewhere here... A little nudity never hurt anybody. xponent TITSORGTFO Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Inauguration
- Original Message - From: John Garcia john...@gmail.com To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Tuesday, January 20, 2009 1:49 PM Subject: Inauguration I love this stuff, the Ruffles and Flourishes, 21 gun salute, the Marine Band playing Stars and Stripes Forever. I liked Obama's speech. Maybe not as good as the Grant Park victory speech, but way up there. So one administration ends and another begins. Stay tuned to quote a friend of mine the day after the election: Ain't this some shit! john what's next maru This guy comes up to me His face red like a rose on a thorn bush Like all the colours of a royal flush And he's peeling off those dollar bills Slapping them down - one hundred, two hundred And I can see those fighter planes And I can see those fighter planes Across the mud huts as the children sleep Through the alleys of a quiet city street We take the staircase to the first floor We turn the key and slowly unlock the door A man breathes into a saxophone And through the walls we hear the city groan Outside it's America - outside it's America I keep hearing those last 2 lines in my head, but it is in a new context. Hopeful and waiting as opposed to the cynicism of the preceding lyrics. One watches with anticipation. xponent A Little U2 In The Night Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: biofuels and Li Batteries.
- Original Message - From: hkhenson hkhen...@rogers.com To: brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 9:17 PM Subject: Re: biofuels and Li Batteries. At 01:00 PM 1/13/2009, Dan M wrote: I agree, but bioengineered fuels are not ethanol. There are algae that exist right now that produce aviation fuel with 1000x the efficiency of ethanol. I have a hard time with this statement. Corn comes fairly close to 3% sunlight to fixed carbon. If you lose 2/3rd of it in the process of making ethanol, then it's still 1% efficient. 1000x would mean you are getting ten times as much energy out as is going into the process. That's against the law. I suppose over a year corn could be less than 0.1% efficient, but you would still be talking about 100% efficient conversion of sunlight to fuel. snip No, there are breakthroughs in many fields that are never mass marketed. What I am saying is that we don't know until we know. In my own career, there have been many times, before I ran an experiment, I was pretty sure I knew how something would work, but it didn't, and I had to scramble. Take for example, scaling up the recent Stanford breakthrough of increasing the Li-I battery capacity 10x. Is that possible from an energy standpoint? Lithium Ion batteries currently are 25 times worse than gasoline. So a 10x improvement would be 2.5 times less energy than gasoline. But gasoline gets 65% of the mass that goes into tapping it for energy from the air. Thus a Li-I battery with this kind of performance would be darn near as energetic as a tank full of gasoline and oxygen. Have a URL for this report? Might be these: http://www.shortnews.com/start.cfm?id=67454 http://gcep.stanford.edu/research/factsheets/liion_battery_cathodes.html http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/12/071219103105.htm http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2008/january9/nanowire-010908.html http://www.intomobile.com/2008/01/02/stanford-researchers-develop-super-long-lasting-lithium-ion-battery.html http://www.powerpulse.net/story.php?storyID=19901 xponent Easy Bake Oven Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
- Original Message - From: Dan M dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Monday, January 12, 2009 12:56 PM Subject: RE: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? First, I got a not there when looking for the paper. Second, batteries will have to become many orders of magnitude better for storage of power generation at off peak times for use at peak timesparticularly if we are thinking of things like wind power which would be close to economically feasible right now if there was such a storage mechanism. There are a few companies currently promoting business plans wherein downtown office buildings would purchase *used* current technology Li-ion auto batteries to store off-peak power for re-use during peak hours. Storing power on-site would have some advantages. Let me run some numbers to give a feel for this. Let's say we have a 200 MW wind farm (say 300 MW nameplate, allowing for nominal winds to below nameplate), and will need to store 100 hours worth of energy to make it feasible to use it as a stand alone facility. That means we'd need 20 GWh of storage. That doesn't resemble any plan I've seen. What I've seen has storage only mitigating peak usage for 24 hour cycles. If the wind doesn't blow, you just lose out on savings. According to http://www.allaboutbatteries.com/Battery-Energy.html storing this energy with the type of advanced Li-I batteries we've been seeing in the best cars, we'd have to pay 80 billion for the storage. The windfarm itself costs only 300 million in my example, so you see that battery storage is far away from economical for this purpose. That's why folks are looking at lowering the cost of conversion to hydrogen and compressed air storage downhole. I think we discussed this about a year or so ago. One of our wind power discussions. Now, I'm not saying that finding a cheaper better battery is impossible. Rather, I'm arguing that it will take a breakthrough. Thus, I'd argue for the government funding nanotech and nanochemistry as the best means of approaching this. Already occuring. Industry is also funding considerable reseach on it's own. A lot of good reseach results have already come in as a result of battery nano-research. There is already a Li-ion battery that will recharge to 90% of capacity in 10 minutes and full charge (from dead) in less than an hour. They are working on manufacturing techniques to reduce cost and increase reliability, but that news is around a year old. If we can get Li-I batteries to increase their capacity by say 10x, while holding their cost constant, then electric cars become economically feasible. But, if we don't, then we can subsidize electric cars with hundreds of billions and we still won't have anything more than an expensive subsidy program, like ethanol. When manufacturing capacity comes online here in the US costs should come down fairly dramatically. The problem currently is that there are only a few manufacturers, almost all overseas, and none can supply enough to cause a price drop. But there is a LOT of money to be made even with lower prices, so there are a good number of companies vying for a piece of the pie. xponent Numbers Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
- Original Message - From: Dan M dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Monday, January 12, 2009 2:05 PM Subject: RE: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? -Original Message- From: brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com [mailto:brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com] On Behalf Of xponentrob Sent: Saturday, January 10, 2009 9:11 PM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? - Original Message - From: Dan M dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Saturday, January 10, 2009 1:24 PM Subject: RE: Scouted: U.S. Heh! I'm aware of the math involved. Frex: http://www.gunaxin.com/chevy-volt-bmw-mini-tesla-roadster/4055 Worth reading. Especially the part where he stated he has no idea why gas prices dropped so much. :-) Did you see 60 Minutes last night? Seems like there might be a little fallout. The problem with breaking down the math is that it pretty well preaches to the already-decided. People are going to buy what they want to buy unless they just can't afford to, and that is likely the only math that counts. That pretty much means that some people will take a premium hit if they believe that there will be other indirect benefits. Then too, it must be repeated that these are initial estimates, and that the prices will inevitably lower. It is just a question of how much, and that kind of market forcasting is near impossible at the moment for anyone. But, to first order, curve fitting of past prices aren't bad for things that are technology based (this clearly doesn't work for commodities that show both highly inelastic supply and highly inelastic demand). That is why bioengineering is an area that has potential; its costs are dropping a factor of 2 per year. Battery costs aren't. Now, we only need a factor of 10 for batteries, so it is possible that nanotech will provide a solution. So, I'd say fund nanotech, not the present technology, which won't give us the home run that is needed. Well.short to midterm. we don't need a homerun, we just need a single. We don't need an electric car that matches a gasoline powered auto in every specification. Hybrids will do that job well enough. We need electrics for city driving and commuting. This involves some changes in habits, but nothing drastic. Most families own 2 vehicles and what most people are proposing is that 1 of them be more efficient and clean. If you put together a series of singles, you can get a score. It doesn't have to be a perfect vehicle right off the bat. Virtually every car is more vehicle than people need on a day to day basis anyway, so it isn't as if folks are going to be suffering if they own an electric or a hybrid. Vaporware? The Tesla can be bought. The others are still being configured and are not available for sale. I've always been skeptical about what the price and performance will be. The engineering rule is that projects take twice as long and cost twice as much. Cutting this factor down, because they are in prototype stage, a conservative estimate is that costs are 30% higher than discussed. They talked about 5 people, they talked about 240 miles, but never said that 5 people could be taken 240 miles. My guess is that the 5 person seating is tight, and only for the 80 mile version of the carotherwise they'd explicitly say otherwise (If I were the project manager I'd be all over the tech. writer's back to make sure that the capacity was stated explicitly if it existed...if it wasn't there, I'd be happy with what they wrote). Second, the 240 miles would probably be under ideal conditions. Exactly the same as with gasoline vehicles, only no one ever questions this. For some reason I find that humorous. Because we have real personal benchmark against which we can measure the difference and because someone other than the companies themselves test MPG ratings? Wellthe government establishes MPG ratings, and they do it with only one passenger, the driver. I don't see that your criticism amounts to much in this case. (Ever notice the YMMV disclaimer? I think that is especially applicable in this discussionG) You also have to factor in the lower costs of using electricity as an energy source. I was assuming 0 electricity costs. Depending on where one lives, gas is 3 - 5 times as costly as the equivilent in watts. What is the value of a vehicle you may have zero maintainance with in the first 5 years? Like my computer power supplies? The car that isn't built yet is like the backup quarterback when the team is struggling.no problems are reported. I can think of 2 ways to respond here. I have often installed frequency drives in areas that were hot and had constant vibration. I expect
Detroit Auto Show/Hybrids and Electrics (was: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/business/11electric.html?ref=autoshow http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/automobiles/autoshow/11SHOW.html?em Ford http://www.freep.com/article/20090111/BUSINESS03/90111045/1016/BUSINESS01/Ford+outlines+electric++hybrid+plans http://www.autoweek.com/article/20090111/FREE/901119989 http://www.foxbusiness.com/story/markets/industries/industrials/magna-ford-motor-company-partner-introduce-ero-emission-battery-electric-1518830864/ Chrysler http://www.autoweek.com/article/20090111/FREE/901109991 http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087sid=aHCn5mV9BjR4refer=home GM http://info.detnews.com/redesign/blogs/autoshowblog/index.cfm?blogid=363 http://blog.wired.com/cars/2009/01/gm-promises-a-4.html http://jalopnik.com/343835/detroit-auto-show--2009-saturn-vue-green-line-2-mode-hybrid http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/automobiles/autoshow/11BATTERY.html?_r=1ref=autoshow Toyota http://uk.reuters.com/article/marketsNewsUS/idUKN1129586120090111 http://blogs.cars.com/kickingtires/2009/01/toyota-ftev-concept-at-2009-detroit-auto-show.html http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/toyota-plug-in-hybrid-coming-this-year/ Honda http://blogs.cars.com/kickingtires/2009/01/2010-honda-insi.html Mercedes http://www.autobloggreen.com/2009/01/10/detroit-2009-mercedes-benz-unveils-the-concept-bluezero/ BYD (China) http://www.autobloggreen.com/2009/01/09/detroit-preview-byds-f3dm-plug-in-hybrid-will-be-unveiled-mond/ xponent In Cars Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
- Original Message - From: Dan M dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Thursday, January 08, 2009 9:14 PM Subject: RE: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? The Tesla is not the best example one could use. I think the Heuliez Will is a better example of an electric vehicle that is just about there. The price should be around 27-34K (when it hits market) and the car can do 0 - 60 in around 10 seconds with a top speed of 87MPH and has a range of248 miles. Yes, but if you read what they write carefully, they never say that they can go with long range and carry a full passenger load. If you compare it with domestic sub-compact cars, it looks as though its maximum range version will carry about the same as a 11k sub-compact car. It is not as sexy as the Tesla, but it is much more of a reply to peoples needs than the Tesla and costs should go down as more are manufactured. And, it's still being designed, according to the manufacturers. Costs go up and performance goes down on vaporware cars, in my experience. Yes, it hit the auto show, but its not going to be produced for a year or more, and we all know how that can change things. Basically, who but a rich environmentalist would buy a car like this at 3x the price of a comparable gas engine car that gets 40-50 mpg highway? Sheesh Dan! You are exaggerating your argument a bit don't you think? Looking around, I can't find many cars that are even close to 11K MSRP excepting a few Kias and the Toyota Yaris Chevy Aveo, and Nissan Versa; and none of them are getting the kind of gas mileage you specify. Indeed, only the Yaris breaks 30 MPG. (Granted, cars are selling at an average of 14.9% below MSRP these days) Vaporware? Heck, the car is an example of a design I prefer, and one that looks to be adopted by other manufacturers. As I've mentioned before, all the attention is focused on the high end vehicles, and the manufacturers of such claim they will work their way down the pyramid so that the eventual low end auto buyers will reap the most benefit of cost reductions when they are able to purchase a BEV/HBEV. The big existing manufacturers are starting near the middle of their lines and working out from there, starting with hybrids. I like the Active Wheel design because the energy is being used as close to the pavement as possible, and not being wasted spinning drive shafts and transmissions. That was the point of using that particular car as an example, plus that a giant like Michelin was working on the design. (Personally, I don't find that particular model/body style to be too interesting. It looks like something out of the 70s.) I understand the argument you are trying to make. The key is battery development. And there are economic issues that could miscarry the entire trend... if normal and simple economics were to hold sway. But I don't think those kinds of economic arguments will hold in the long run. There is political will running in from several directions that will create a sort of ad hoc alliance to promote hybrids and BEVs. It appears that concern over Peak Oil is growing. There are National Security issues due to the large amount of imported oil from less than friendly cultures. People are generally disgusted with importing oil from less than friendly cultures. Environmental concerns over Greenhouse Gas emissions. Environmental concerns over pollution emissions. / Medical concerns over pollution emissions. People worry about future Gas Price Shocks such as we had last summer. Large auto manufacturers see startups like Tesla as a Threat. There are also some seedling issues. Potential fuel tax increases that would bring us to par with Europe. The decreased cost of ownership potential for electrics. (Up to an order of magnitude fewer moving parts, less need for maintenance[almost none], practically no oil products used except for joint lube etc...) Electricity is cheaper than gas (cost/mile) The possibility that congested and polluted cities could outlaw ICE use in certain districts (London Frex) It seems to me that you are looking at where we are with an eye to the next few years. I'm looking at where the trends seem to be taking us with and eye to the next decade, maybe 2. That difference in range can give a lot of variance to what the trends will tell you. Amirite? xponent Electromotive Forces Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
- Original Message - From: Dan M dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Saturday, January 10, 2009 1:24 PM Subject: RE: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? -Original Message- From: brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com [mailto:brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com] On Behalf Of xponentrob Sent: Saturday, January 10, 2009 11:50 AM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? Sheesh Dan! You are exaggerating your argument a bit don't you think? Looking around, I can't find many cars that are even close to 11K MSRP excepting a few Kias and the Toyota Yaris Chevy Aveo, and Nissan Versa; and none of them are getting the kind of gas mileage you specify. Indeed, only the Yaris breaks 30 MPG. (Granted, cars are selling at an average of 14.9% below MSRP these days) OK, I was doing milage from memory. But, my bigger Escort gets 30, so I thought these smaller cars got a bit more. But, let's just take 30. At $1.50/gal, that's 5 cents/mile. Lets say these cars are kept for 150k, which is on the high side...that's 7.5k for gas. The break even point, assuming CDs pay zero, with the MSRP discount, is close to $6.00/gal. And, that's comparing with a smaller car. Heh! I'm aware of the math involved. Frex: http://www.gunaxin.com/chevy-volt-bmw-mini-tesla-roadster/4055 Worth reading. The problem with breaking down the math is that it pretty well preaches to the already-decided. People are going to buy what they want to buy unless they just can't afford to, and that is likely the only math that counts. That pretty much means that some people will take a premium hit if they believe that there will be other indirect benefits. Then too, it must be repeated that these are initial estimates, and that the prices will inevitably lower. It is just a question of how much, and that kind of market forcasting is near impossible at the moment for anyone. Vaporware? The Tesla can be bought. The others are still being configured and are not available for sale. I've always been skeptical about what the price and performance will be. The engineering rule is that projects take twice as long and cost twice as much. Cutting this factor down, because they are in prototype stage, a conservative estimate is that costs are 30% higher than discussed. They talked about 5 people, they talked about 240 miles, but never said that 5 people could be taken 240 miles. My guess is that the 5 person seating is tight, and only for the 80 mile version of the carotherwise they'd explicitly say otherwise (If I were the project manager I'd be all over the tech. writer's back to make sure that the capacity was stated explicitly if it existed...if it wasn't there, I'd be happy with what they wrote). Second, the 240 miles would probably be under ideal conditions. Exactly the same as with gasoline vehicles, only no one ever questions this. For some reason I find that humorous. I'm not opposed to electric cars, I just try to use the rules of thumb I've learned from engineering on all comers...those I'm rooting for as well as against. Realistically, after a recovery, long term gasoline prices should average in the $2.50 range. I know that if we could get $80 oil (in 2008 dollars) promised for the next 10 years, everyone in the oil patch would be very very happy. Electric cars will have to compete against that. So, the math has to work out that waythe lower payments on gas will have to balance the higher payments on the car note for the average Joe and Joan. You also have to factor in the lower costs of using electricity as an energy source. Depending on where one lives, gas is 3 - 5 times as costly as the equivilent in watts. What is the value of a vehicle you may have zero maintainance with in the first 5 years? What will be the differences in warranties? There are a lot of unanswered questions that effect value. I understand the argument you are trying to make. The key is battery development. And there are economic issues that could miscarry the entire trend... if normal and simple economics were to hold sway. But I don't think those kinds of economic arguments will hold in the long run. There is political will running in from several directions that will create a sort of ad hoc alliance to promote hybrids and BEVs. I believe that. I wouldn't doubt that people will be able to pitch for over 100 billion in government money for projects. That is happening now. The question is whether it will have more of a real impact that the 30 billion/year we have thrown at ethanol. Eventually, I think the answer is Yes. I don't think there is any question that there is a need to get away from carbon based fuels and from millions of mobile units burning them at various rates of inefficiency. IMO ethanol is not really
Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
- Original Message - From: Dan M dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Thursday, January 08, 2009 4:59 PM Subject: RE: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? -Original Message- From: brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com [mailto:brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com] On Behalf Of xponentrob Sent: Wednesday, January 07, 2009 7:21 PM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? If one wants to make direct comparisons of a type of batteries capabilities, one has to go no farther than a hardware store or Lowes or Home Depot. I've been using cordless drills for a couple of decades. They were once using Ni-Cad batteries, until the Nimh batteries swallowed the market. The Ni-Cad and Nimh battery packs were pretty much the same size and performed about the same, only Nimh had a slight edge in most categories. In the last 2 years Li-ion batteries have begun to take over the market. The battery packs are smaller and lighter, but deliver more power and torque and do it for longer with a shorter recharge time. In short, Li-ion are starting to dominate the market and it is a market that has requirements that has similarities to the requirements in Auto applications. I agree with your methodology, but wish to add one thing: cost. The added cost for modest energy densities is not a big factor, but at $4.27 per Wh, it means a lot if one needs a lot of watt hours. In the case of power tools, the use isn't as much as one thinks, My memory is that the Tesla uses these batteries, and its price tag has a lot to do with how expensive they are. I think we'd need a factor of 10 reduction in price/Wh before they are commercially feasible for Joe and Joan commuter. But, I would not necessarily rule that out; because the evidence for research on the techniques indicates that there may be some room for improvements both in storage density and price per battery. The Tesla is not the best example one could use. I think the Heuliez Will is a better example of an electric vehicle that is just about there. The price should be around 27-34K (when it hits market) and the car can do 0 - 60 in around 10 seconds with a top speed of 87MPH and has a range of248 miles. It is not as sexy as the Tesla, but it is much more of a reply to peoples needs than the Tesla and costs should go down as more are manufactured. The Chevy Volt looks to be similarly placed, though it is a series hybrid. The other factor is that we will either need to switch to nuclear power for virtually all of our electricity or find a very efficient high volume energy storage system to match with wind. Right now, power grids can count on only 5% or so of the rated capacity of wind farms. Pairing them with natural gas plants makes this reasonable, but then we are burning fossil fuels to get the electricity. That's slightly better for the environment than gasoline, but far worse than high tech biofuels that might come on line in 5-10 years. So, in the short term, I'd argue for building nuclear plants, finding ways to make batteries denser and cheaper, and biofuels from non-food sources which produce aviation fuel far more efficiently than ethanol is produced, developing high efficiency massive energy storage, and a raise in the gas tax. But, you've heard that before. :-) True, and I am in agreement with you most of the time on this subject. But I must caution against accidental hyperbole. The Tesla is a high end sports car. Using it as an example with regards to commuting is a bit over the top. Understandable, since it has about the highest profile (among potential consumers) of any BEV, but the car was designed to show possibilities and capabilities,not to be a mainstream or even a commuter vehicle. xponent Compacts Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
- Original Message - From: Dan M dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Wednesday, January 07, 2009 12:33 PM Subject: RE: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? -Original Message- From: brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com [mailto:brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com] On Behalf Of Bruce Bostwick Sent: Monday, January 05, 2009 11:42 PM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? On Jan 5, 2009, at 2:58 PM, Dan M wrote: The few productive industries we have in the USA now (the auto industry springing immediately to mind) are in such sad shape -- in the auto industry's case, from putting more energy into fighting a phase c hange into a PHEV/BEV based market than they are into any real RD or new product development -- that they cost more than they generate in value. To me, that seems unsustainable. Am I missing something here? They don't have to put any energy into fighting it; the consumers are happily doing it for them. The sale of the hybrid Prias (sp) has fallen about 50%. Electric cars are toys for the rich. Battery technology has not improved much in the last 20 years, even though there is a multi- billion battery market where one can make a handy profit right now, outside of the car market, by marketing a better battery. Battery technology has matured to the point where it's definitely possible to build a NiMH powered car with at least 140 mile range. If it weren't, it probably would be only academic that Cobasys/Ovonics holds patents to large format NiMH batteries that it refuses to license for automotive use, primarily because it's a wholly owned subsidiary of Chevron. Hmmm, that sounds like the common conspiracy theory, like the 200 mpg carburetor design that was held as a trade secret by an oil company (the company varied with the theory) back in the '60s and '70s. We know that these batteries are buyable on the market in standard over the counter battery usage, and have found a good niche as a camera battery. If they were that good, why didn't they overtake this market? Second, if you look at at http://www.cobasys.com/news/20070313.shtml you will find the proud announcement of their use in automobiles. You will find a confirmation of this at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nickel_metal_hydride_battery where their use in Saturns is mentioned. The demand is there, make no mistake about it. That's a fairly strong statement. At a low enough price, I'd believe it. But, there are real problems with batteries. Look at http://www.allaboutbatteries.com/Battery-Energy.html and you'll see what I mean. We know that the energy density of gasoline is about 46 MJ/Kg. Compare this to the best, most expensive battery (Li ion), and we get a factor of 100. Electric cars are more efficient (90% vs 20%), so this gets down to a factor of 22 or so in power/weight. And, using the highly efficient batteries has a cost, that's why the Tesla Roadster costs 100k. Replacement cost on the batteries is 20k, but I suspect that a lot of that cost will eventually disappear when more manufacturers get into the game and the economies of scale come into play. Each Tesla requires 6831 laptop batteries and that is largely the reason for the cost. Query: IIRC ICE extract only 12% of the available energy from gasoline. Is that already factored into your comparison or is it something to still be considered? I think the best comparison you could make is cost/mile as it directly shows costs and savings for the additional premium one would outlay. We know that the modest amount of batteries in a hybrid raises the prices 4-5k. We know that the Prius hybrid sales are now falling like a rock (factor of 2 Dec-Dec, and probably significantly more June-Dec), due to the added cost and the cheap price of gas. So, why would there be extensive demand for an expensive commuter car that can only be used for relatively short trips? For exactly the same reasons people bought hybrids before gas prices started rising so much last year. (BTW the Tesla gets 244 miles between charges with the new transmission) All car dealers are experiencing a slump ATM, in large part due to a lack of available credit, so I think some fudging of expectation is allowed. So, after the economy starts moving towards something like a new normalcy, I'm thinking we will see some increases on gas taxes as a means to limit fuel usage (a small shunt on CO2 emissions?) and decrease national indebtedness. In the meantime competition should improve the abilities of BEVs (batteries too) and the more golfcart-like models will become unremembered history. As soon as a 100-mile- range battery powered car is available, there are plenty of people who would much rather charge their cars overnight (on off-peak electrical
Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
- Original Message - From: Dan M dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Wednesday, January 07, 2009 6:49 PM Subject: RE: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? -Original Message- From: brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com [mailto:brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com] On Behalf Of Lance A. Brown Sent: Wednesday, January 07, 2009 1:44 PM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? Dan M wrote: Look at http://www.allaboutbatteries.com/Battery-Energy.html And if you RTFA, you'll see a not implausible argument made by Sherry Boschertthat Cabasys is squelching the market for large-format NiMH batteries: It seems very implausible to me. And, I think I have some expertise with companies playing hard-ball with intellectual property. You can look at the reference I gave earlier to a recent Boston Globe article that discusses the export of one of my inventions to Iran and see how easy it is for big foreign companies to do workarounds on patents. In particular, what is patented is not NiMH batteries, but one particular technique for using them. Any patent attorney worth his salt can have modest rework written to look like a new variation, not really covered by the original patent...especially if he has good sized companies at his side. If you look at this patent, there is no reason that folks like Sony, Toyota, etc. would not be willing to have their own Japanese patents on similar techniques, and have the case settled in Japanese courts. By the time the case is settled, 2012 would have rolled around. I served on a patent committee for the second largest oilfield service company in the world for 8 years, and am very familiar with how this works. It's not that Chevron wouldn't play hardball, it's that Chevron would play hardball to win money. Sitting on a patent that's about to expire is just stupid, unless you own the lion share of the oil business. There total revenue is about 8% of the crude oil sales from last yearand their last quarterly filing has them buying 49 billion of crude for the quarter vs. 79 billion in revenue. So, they are less than 5% of the crude oil production business. Further, they have licensed their battery technology to big car companies for their production hybrids. That's not sitting on it. You may argue that their strategy is flawed because they don't sell to small startups, but they do sell batteries for large scale automotive usewhich is not sitting on the patent. Finally, if this battery were that good, why isn't it dominating the small rechargeable battery market, where it is being sold without restrictions (e.g. you can buy them over the 'net)? Why don't all cell phones use this battery? Might it be the result of the energy density not being all that high? If one wants to make direct comparisons of a type of batteries capabilities, one has to go no farther than a hardware store or Lowes or Home Depot. I've been using cordless drills for a couple of decades. They were once using Ni-Cad batteries, until the Nimh batteries swallowed the market. The Ni-Cad and Nimh battery packs were pretty much the same size and performed about the same, only Nimh had a slight edge in most categories. In the last 2 years Li-ion batteries have begun to take over the market. The battery packs are smaller and lighter, but deliver more power and torque and do it for longer with a shorter recharge time. In short, Li-ion are starting to dominate the market and it is a market that has requirements that has similarities to the requirements in Auto applications. The only battery I see coming that might be superior is the very very new Silver-Zinc batteries. They are so new I have only read about them (I don't think they are even being manufactured yet.), but they sound quite promising and I expect they will be very expensive. xponent Silver Lining Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
- Original Message - From: Dan M dsummersmi...@comcast.net To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Wednesday, January 07, 2009 7:12 PM Subject: RE: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? -Original Message- From: brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com [mailto:brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com] On Behalf Of xponentrob Sent: Tuesday, January 06, 2009 12:09 AM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? If there's biofuel technology that doesn't significantly impact the food stream as a source of motor vehicle fuel, then I'm all for it. I'm not anywhere near PC myself, and if there's a GMO solution that actually does provide a decent rate of return without investing more energy in getting energy out of the fuel produced or cut too deeply into the food supply, great. Hadn't heard of this. These days I'm looking cynically at biofuels. they do nothing to reduce CO2 levels in most cases (most applications are for ICE), I'm not sure I follow you here. Present biofuels are bad, they divert food into products that have low net energy out per energy unit in. I have no problem with that argument. But, under lab conditions they've gotten over 1000x the yield of corn. That isn't what I was addressing actually. Present biofuels (FTMP) take carbon out of the air when being grown and then dump it right back into the atmosphere when being used. Worse, they take frex, sulpher out of the ground and it either gets into the atmosphere or into sequestration where it could also escape as a form of pollution. Remember that my stance against CO2 is that it is a pollutant, primarily. Greenhouse effects are a secondary consideration for me. Now, there are problems with the algae; it's especially susceptible to fungi attacks. But, with bioengineering costs dropping a factor of two per year, this appears to be an area that can be tweaked, one way or another. It would be akin to knowing you needed a megaflop machine to get your work done back in '76Moore's law would make you optimistic. Battery performance has progressed at a much slower rate. Agreed. With biofuels my concerns are that they will mostly be used in ICE which are very inefficient at *using* energy. With batteries, it seems to me that having an energy source that fits the need is is of greater import than having an excess of stored energy to burn (such as is the situation with liquid hydrocarbon fuels). What I'm trying to say is that with some improvement in battery technology we will have a system that fits transportation needs in most cases, as opposed to the one size fits all cases and damn the waste system we currently employ. Biofuels do not change the equation too much if we are going to continue employing ICEs. but there is some hope for a good fuel for Fuel Cells That is another possibility for energy storage for cars I would prefer Biofuels be used in Fuel Cell cars. It is a much more efficient use of the stored energy. and there *will* be a long term need for diesels. More critically for biofuel: aviation. It will be a long time before a battery can power a 777 for 8000 miles. You are correct sir! I was thinking more along the lines of Trains and 18 wheelers. I think it unlikely that batteries will be able to do much more than moderate energy use with very heavy and flying vehicles. xponent Commerce Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: hybrids and batteries
- Original Message - From: Chris Frandsen lear...@mac.com To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Wednesday, January 07, 2009 7:50 PM Subject: Re: hybrids and batteries Battery technology is moving very fast as is ultracapacitor technology which has the advantage of rapid recharging over batteries. And much of that technology is the product of good old USA innovation and creativity. The problem is that for most of the last 10 years all new battery plants have been built overseas with the great majority going to China. China gave good incentives to get those plants because they have a problem and they know it. both environment and access to petroleum. China has mandated that all vehicle manufactured after 2012 must be electric and that battery manufacturers must supply domestic demand before they can export product. If we do not get on the stick and start building our own manufacturing base we will find ourselves in the predicament of choosing our poison, Chinese batteries or foreign oil, who do we want to send our money to? If you haven't seen these already they should make you smile: http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/12/american-lithium-ion-batter-makers-form-alliance.php http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122904767715400759.html?mod=googlenews_wsj xponent Energizer Panda Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years?
- Original Message - From: Bruce Bostwick lihan161...@sbcglobal.net To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Monday, January 05, 2009 11:42 PM Subject: Re: Scouted: U.S. to collapse in next two years? On Jan 5, 2009, at 2:58 PM, Dan M wrote: The few productive industries we have in the USA now (the auto industry springing immediately to mind) are in such sad shape -- in the auto industry's case, from putting more energy into fighting a phase c hange into a PHEV/BEV based market than they are into any real RD or new product development -- that they cost more than they generate in value. To me, that seems unsustainable. Am I missing something here? They don't have to put any energy into fighting it; the consumers are happily doing it for them. The sale of the hybrid Prias (sp) has fallen about 50%. Electric cars are toys for the rich. Battery technology has not improved much in the last 20 years, even though there is a multi- billion battery market where one can make a handy profit right now, outside of the car market, by marketing a better battery. Battery technology has matured to the point where it's definitely possible to build a NiMH powered car with at least 140 mile range. If it weren't, it probably would be only academic that Cobasys/Ovonics holds patents to large format NiMH batteries that it refuses to license for automotive use, primarily because it's a wholly owned subsidiary of Chevron. Most of the electrics are using Lithium Ion batteries and getting ranges similar to what you posit here. Indeed, several exceed 140 MPC, though they generally are high end and expensive. Altairnano Technology has batteries that will work like new after 180,000 miles. There are plenty of amazing advances being made currently (NPI). Toyota lost the patent lawsuit over the EV-95 battery used in the RAV4- EV, which is one major reason why it never made it to production, and the only reason RAV4-EV's are still on the road is that their leases weren't as airtight with the no-buyout language as those for the EV1, which GM reposessed en masse and sent to the crusher the moment the California ZEV mandate was effectively nullified. The demand is there, make no mistake about it. As soon as a 100-mile- range battery powered car is available, there are plenty of people who would much rather charge their cars overnight (on off-peak electrical power, at home) and get the energy equivalent of 150 mpg (even counting the overall 70% charge efficiency of the battery system) for the daily commute. Enough that even one production generation will bring the concept close enough to maturity for them to displace gasoline-powered vehicles. The Prius isn't quite what it could be. In a plug-chargeable configuration (which is sold, and legal, everywhere but the USA -- ever notice that blank spot in the row of buttons on the dash? In Japan, the EV button goes there -- the car runs entirely off the battery for a significant distance, which could be substantially improved with a different battery/charger/firmware arrangement.) a lot of short-range commutes become grid-powered. It's not a hard conversion if you don't mind voiding the warranty, people are doing it successfully here. The demand is dropping mainly because a substantial part of this country's population thinks gasoline prices will never, ever go back up. Is that the best metric to go by when forecasting demand? The Chevy Volt looks like it has a chance to be a Prius killer. It is just a better system. Contrast this with the bioengineered biofuel market, which the US is clearly leading. European rules are so strict, they might as well prohibit bioengineering. But, in the US, costs for the tools of the trade are dropping faster than Moore's law: almost a factor of two per year. This isn't PC, because we're tampering with nature, but it has a much better chance of working than solutions that have a horrid cost/benefit ratio. If there's biofuel technology that doesn't significantly impact the food stream as a source of motor vehicle fuel, then I'm all for it. I'm not anywhere near PC myself, and if there's a GMO solution that actually does provide a decent rate of return without investing more energy in getting energy out of the fuel produced or cut too deeply into the food supply, great. Hadn't heard of this. These days I'm looking cynically at biofuels. they do nothing to reduce CO2 levels in most cases (most applications are for ICE), but there is some hope for a good fuel for Fuel Cells and there *will* be a long term need for diesels. xponent Watt?The Current News Is Shocking Mr Volta! Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Rock Around the World
- Original Message - From: Rceeberger rceeber...@comcast.net To: Brin-L brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Saturday, October 11, 2008 12:44 PM Subject: Rock Around the World I've been saying for a good while that the Japanese are ready to jump onto the world stage when it comes to Rock music. There are some fine fine musicians and composers in Japan making original music. A small update on the subject. There has been a bit of movement since the last time I wrote on this and I have discovered some new artists that re-enforce my expectations. Joe Inoue is an American by birth but has jumped into prominence in Japan recently with his song Closer being used as the opener for Naruto Shippuden. The Video for Closer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUslOheidl4 and how it is used as a show opener: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bCPpVI5U0I How could I have left out Yui? Rolling Star http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U4bkmspQhms Okinawa has spawn several popular bands in recent years, Orange Range, High And Mighty Color, and now (all girl band) Stereo Pony. Hitohira No Hanabira http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91KrwOEK98k Bands I'm liking a lot these days: Ikimono Gakari Hanabi http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emrd1iMeaEg June (some kind of Michael Jackson wannabe) Baby It's You http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1dT0ANlLnA Aqua Timez Alones http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qozO_oiAqsU Some of these videos are actually fun to watch. xponent Weekend Update Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: 40 years ago . . .
- Original Message - From: Ronn! Blankenship ronn_blankens...@bellsouth.net To: Killer Bs Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Wednesday, December 24, 2008 1:32 PM Subject: 40 years ago . . . On this day in 1968, the crew of Apollo 8 enters into orbit around the Moon, becoming the first humans to do so. They performed 10 lunar orbits and broadcast live TV pictures that became the famous Christmas Eve Broadcast, one of the most watched programs in history. They read from the book of Genesis (How many people think there would have been a sudden loss of signal if they tried that today?) OK, I give up.how many? xponent Not Buying Into That One Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Financial institution fallout
- Original Message - From: John Williams [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Monday, December 08, 2008 2:37 PM Subject: Re: Financial institution fallout On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 11:08 AM, Dan M [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: No, I was asking simple questions about techniques. Discussions between people on a paper, results, etc. depend on agreement on techniques for evaluation. I asked whether you agreed on a few essential techniques of empirical investigation. No, you were rambling on with nonsense, failing to address a single argument in the Higg's paper. Seems like you are the only one who gives a crap about the Higgs paper. We are awaiting news of Higgs boson. That's not the point being argued. You see, all but a few people understand that money is a placeholder; it is a social construct. Numbers in a computer or pieces of paper with dead presidents on them have meaning only within a society. Sophistry. Money can be converted to gold, and gold has value in every society. You are just trying to rationalize taking wealth from others because you think you know how to spend it better than they do. Money can be converted to water or blue-ray DVD players too. So what? Again, it aint just *your* money. Thus, if you are a member of this society, you play by its rules. America has a long history of forcing things on others. That does not make it right or good. Oops! John is trying to force his opinions on others again. But, your arguments for radical individualism are about as sensible as someone arguing that people are just a construct, all that exist are quarks, leptons, and all the particles that transmit the forces. What an incredibly egotistical statement. Your egotism never ceases to amaze and amuse me. Let's just throw out all moral rights of a person to keep what is theirs because Dan doesn't like them, and for good measure, let's call John insensible because he thinks he has a right to his wealth and posessions. Hilarious! Again with the myth of your individuality. Face it, you are nothing more than a pseudopod of the genome collecting a view. I've tasted your kool-aid and boy oh boy is it yummy! Mighty delicious but hardly nutritious, and it has too much vitamin D-elusion. No man is an island, but on your island Noman is killing you Polyphemus, and yet you complain about golden fleecing. Meanwhile the rest of us cling below the fleece and mostly escape dangers. A *group* effort to be sure. (Yes, I am making fun of you. Maybe you will get the metaphors) I don't know if I can read any more of your posts I am laughing so hard! The rest of us are laughing too, but for different reasons I'm sure. xponent Myth-Adventure Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Forry Ackerman
- Original Message - From: Ronn! Blankenship [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, December 05, 2008 7:48 PM Subject: Forry Ackerman I haven't seen this mentioned on the list: Forrest J Ackerman died Thursday [December 4th] of heart failure at his Los Angeles home, said Kevin Burns, head of Prometheus Entertainment and a trustee of Ackerman's estate. http://www.lasfsinc.info/index.php?option=com_contenttask=viewid=119Itemid=275 http://tinyurl.com/6lcuo6 I thought he had died 2 years ago or so. Maybe it was reports about the state of his holdings or something. I used to read FMOF pretty regularly when I was a kid. xponent Monsters Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: It's confirmed: Matter is merely vacuum fluctuations
- Original Message - From: Dan M [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Tuesday, December 02, 2008 9:06 PM Subject: RE: It's confirmed: Matter is merely vacuum fluctuations -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of xponentrob Sent: Monday, December 01, 2008 11:06 PM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: Re: It's confirmed: Matter is merely vacuum fluctuations Umyeah. Though I have to admit I'm left wondering if you are talking about questions in the soft sciences (which can seem a bit arbitrary to my mind and subject to change for a variety of reasons), or if you are referring to ultimate questions that lay people tend to think physics aims for. (Just for clarity, I think we both agree when it comes to the subject of Truth) I was thinking more of the latter, but the former also helps bring the problem into perspective. Take psychology. We don't really know what people are thinking. Experts in the field of psychology have been fooled by people who outgamed them. Still, empirical observations are made, and models of those observations (say fivethirtyeight's vote prediction) can prove quite accurate. OK thanks! I'm not sure I understand your statement in that case. Fleishman and Pons observations were certainly called into question, as were their methodologies.Same with, say, creationists. So offhand I would expect that the reliability of observations is important, but recognise that you could be defining observation in a way I am not. I think I am defining reliable differently, partially because I'm rather familiar with the debates of the time when physics emerged. Pons and Fleishman made unrepeatable observations. Creationists use bad technique in evaluating phenomenon. But, Pons and Fleishman's problems were not the uncertainty of the empirical and only a small subset of creationists use idealism to question observations (as Berkley (sp) did). We can make detailed models of the empirical and have rigorous standards for good, repeatable experiments. But, we don't worry about what is really there, we shut up and calculate. In a real sense, this Feynman statement is a culmination of what makes physics what it is. I recall that years ago there was a very lengthy thread here that dealt with metaphysical questions of the ultimate reality and why such philosophical discussion is pretty much meaningless. Actually, I'd argue that meaning is one of those metaphysical questions that cannot be determined empirically. I love the statement in the first preface to the Critique of Pure Reason on this. HUMAN reason has this peculiar fate that in one species of its knowledge it is burdened by questions which, as prescribed by the very nature of reason itself, it is not able to ignore, but which, as transcending all its powers, it is also not able to answer. Thus, I take exception with a science magazine which states that the authors pet interpretation has been proven by a new discovery, when it hasn't. Something has been demonstrated. I agree it is open to interpretation. I can think of other explainations that might satisfy the observations, leakage from tiny higher dimensions frex. None of that is needed. Just standard E=m works (I'm using good physicist units here where c=1. :-) ) That's what's frustrating for me; the New Scientist makes standard QM theory out to be a startling new discovery. The theory dates back to at least the early 30s. Nothing has been demonstrated except that QCD works numerically. If they failed with computers 100x as powerful, and everyone did, then that would be something new, because QCD would have been falsified. One real problem, from my perspective, is that the average layman is trying to fit modern physics back into a classical box. To paraphrase one prominent physicist from the 20s when asked to comment on the correctness of someone's hypothesison a theory he thought was horrid, Right? Right, he isn't even Wrong. This is what the first two paragraphs of the New Scientist article remind me of. Last year everything was all about strings (again), but the article seems to ignore all that and doesn't reference. That's at a layer below what was covered in the article...where theorists try to reconcile GR with QCD and the Electroweak...there strings (and now fuzzy space if 2 year old last reading of John Baez's online This Week In Mathematical Physics is current enough). Of Interest: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16095-its-confirmed-matter-is-merely-vacuum-fluctuations.html Once again, the comments *on* the article are more interesting than the article itself. This gem from Vendicar Decarian for instance: What is and isn't matter is all relative to the observer. What is real particle and what
Re: It's confirmed: Matter is merely vacuum fluctuations
- Original Message - From: Dan M [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Monday, December 01, 2008 10:03 PM Subject: RE: It's confirmed: Matter is merely vacuum fluctuations -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Rceeberger Sent: Sunday, November 30, 2008 9:47 PM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: RE: It's confirmed: Matter is merely vacuum fluctuations On 11/30/2008 5:30:23 PM, Dan M ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: Rob wrote: If physics were anything more than approximate, we would have final answers to all our questions. How? All physics does is model observations. Models make predictions. And over time models have made predictions with greater accuracy and that cover more situations that previous models failed. Mercury anyone? Models also allow us to re-create phenomena for our own purposes. I'm not arguing against modeling observation. Besides paying the bills, it's at the foundation of modern civilization. Without it, we'd be little better off than they were 500 years ago. I was just pointing out that there are plenty of worthwhile questions that will not be answered by science. Umyeah. Though I have to admit I'm left wondering if you are talking about questions in the soft sciences (which can seem a bit arbitrary to my mind and subject to change for a variety of reasons), or if you are referring to ultimate questions that lay people tend to think physics aims for. (Just for clarity, I think we both agree when it comes to the subject of Truth) Physics was created out of Natural Philosophy by tabling the question of the reliability of observations. Which definition of tabling are you using here? Roberts Rules of Order :-) US OK thanks! I'm not sure I understand your statement in that case. Fleishman and Pons observations were certainly called into question, as were their methodologies.Same with, say, creationists. So offhand I would expect that the reliability of observations is important, but recognise that you could be defining observation in a way I am not. Now, you can use the results of physics as a reliable model of what we observe when you do metaphysics. But, it is a really really good idea to not confuse when you are doing physics and when you are doing something else. Otherwise you can wander off into the aether. :-) G I think the implication of what I wrote before is that for most of us there really isn't much of a difference. I would think it quite different when having a formal discussion. Sure, and I appreciate your position. But, I've hoped you remember one of the zillion times I remarked that there are a number of different interpretations of physics: many different realities that are all equally consistent with observations, and for which there is no empirical test short of finding the aether, or something equally startling, to differentiate between the interpretations. I recall that years ago there was a very lengthy thread here that dealt with metaphysical questions of the ultimate reality and why such philosophical discussion is pretty much meaningless. I wish I still had all those old files from my first few years here. Thus, I take exception with a science magazine which states that the authors pet interpretation has been proven by a new discovery, when it hasn't. Something has been demonstrated. I agree it is open to interpretation. I can think of other explainations that might satisfy the observations, leakage from tiny higher dimensions frex. One real problem, from my perspective, is that the average layman is trying to fit modern physics back into a classical box. To paraphrase one prominent physicist from the 20s when asked to comment on the correctness of someone's hypothesison a theory he thought was horrid, Right? Right, he isn't even Wrong. This is what the first two paragraphs of the New Scientist article remind me of. Last year everything was all about strings (again), but the article seems to ignore all that and doesn't reference. xponent Modalities Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Wal-Mart is evil, why it must be eradicated
- Original Message - From: Nick Arnett [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Saturday, November 29, 2008 12:32 PM Subject: Re: Wal-Mart is evil, why it must be eradicated I'll add one thought that keeps coming to me. If free markets reliably regulate prices, how the heck did we have such a crazy spike in oil prices recently? Surely neither supply nor demand changed much in such a short time. And I haven't seen anybody argue that any sort of government intervention was responsible. I suspect that what we've seen in oil, housing and other bubbles is that we have created a system that amplifies fear and greed. I would hold that to be self-evident and supported by market behavior over the last couple of months. xponent The Price Of Oil Today Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: How Government Stoked the Mania
- Original Message - From: Nick Arnett [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Sunday, November 16, 2008 1:25 PM Subject: Re: How Government Stoked the Mania On Sun, Nov 16, 2008 at 9:39 AM, John Williams [EMAIL PROTECTED]wrote: In case you missed it, hear is an article from last month. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122298982558700341.html How Government Stoked the Mania Housing prices would never have risen so high without multiple Washington mistakes This does not make your case for the idea that *regulation* is to blame. In fact, the whole story there is about the government loosening regulations and lowering taxes, not tightening regulations or tax-and-spend politics. No matter what, even this author, a strong advocate of deregulation, couldn't quite bring himself to blame the CRA and Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac. His strongest statement is that they stoked the fire, as the headline reads, not that they lit it. In other words, this adds nothing to what has already been said here. You want to talk about choices and forecasting -- investment bankers and mortgage brokers, who should be as knowledgeable as anyone about these matters, chose, long before the CRA and the government actions, to make these loans, go crazy with leverage and generally bet that housing prices would undergo no major downward adjustments for the next few years. Talk about stupid choices and bad forecasting... The other problem, one that is often overlooked over here, is that this situation is basically occurring worldwide. Since there is not a worldwide government and the rules vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, a more likely place to look for the origin of this disaster is multinationals. xponent Reach Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: polarization
- Original Message - From: Warren Ockrassa [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2008 9:33 PM Subject: Re: polarization On Nov 12, 2008, at 8:18 PM, Jon Louis Mann wrote: i think there is a difference in the bitterness on the left and the venom on the right. both sides feel they are right, but the hate from the right is based on fear, hate and greed, while the left is motivated by idealism, and what defines true patriotism. Ah. But this language itself is so emotionally loaded that it does nothing but contribute to the polarization. (Sure, everyone's pissed, but the left is pissed for more moral reasons!) The sad truth is that the left isn't all that different from the right, not as long as big money continues to control the discourse in DC. Political winds shift, but the lobbyists just change parties to give their attention to. Little else becomes different. You might not have been around to sniff the social winds in the US in 1980, but I was, and let me tell you that the Dems were quite thoroughly corrupted by power and money back then; one of the reasons Reagan won was because of the national trend against abuse of power by Democrats. And, FWIW, McCain *was* quite charismatic in 2000. He actually stood a good chance against W until he was torpedoed by extremists in the Republican party itself -- the same PAC that formed Swift Boat Veterans for Truth to attack Kerry in 2004. To me it seems that there's no real reason, if you're so motivated, to continue attacking the GOP. It's in the middle of its own self- destruction. A better approach might be to talk to the moderates, the centrist Republicans, who are very much like centrist Dems such as Obama, and are quite as horrified by Palin as many others are, and start trying to heal some breaches rather than continuing to hammer at the idea of them (whoever they are) being wrong (whatever that means). Maybe together we can all rediscover what it means for the GOP to be the party of Lincoln. You guys really need to watch The Power Of Nightmares - The Rise Of The Politics Of Fear by Adam Curtis. It really shines a light on the history behind the subject you are discussing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Power_of_Nightmares The Power of Nightmares, subtitled The Rise of the Politics of Fear, is a BBC documentary film series, written and produced by Adam Curtis. Its three one-hour parts consist mostly of a montage of archive footage with Curtis's narration. The series was first broadcast in the United Kingdom in late 2004 and has subsequently been broadcast in multiple countries and shown in several film festivals, including the 2005 Cannes Film Festival. The films compare the rise of the Neo-Conservative movement in the United States and the radical Islamist movement, making comparisons on their origins and claiming similarities between the two. More controversially, it argues that the threat of radical Islamism as a massive, sinister organised force of destruction, specifically in the form of al-Qaeda, is a myth perpetrated by politicians in many countries-and particularly American Neo-Conservatives-in an attempt to unite and inspire their people following the failure of earlier, more utopian ideologies. The Power of Nightmares has been praised by film critics in both Britain and the United States. Its message and content have also been the subject of various critiques and criticisms from conservatives and progressives. http://www.google.com/search?hl=enq=The+power+of+nightmares+bbcaq=foq= xponent Second Try Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Four years ago today...
- Original Message - From: Nick Arnett [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Monday, November 10, 2008 7:32 PM Subject: Four years ago today... It was on this day, in 2004, at the Fallujah train station, that my niece's husband was blown to bits by a rocket. I sure hope that our new administration takes us in the direction he has promised in Iraq. Someday, I hope to see where Wes gave his life. Memories are heavy when you hold them weightless when behind you string them into your sky a kite or a balloon taking one step forward at a time xponent A Prayer For Your Niece Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Proud and relieved
- Original Message - From: xponentrob [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, November 07, 2008 4:54 PM Subject: Re: Proud and relieved - Original Message - From: Deborah Harrell [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, November 07, 2008 3:20 PM Subject: Re: Proud and relieved Jon Louis Mann [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: snip I had obama on a redeye flight from d.c. to chicago two years ago, just before he declared. he was in my section so we chatted for over a half hour. he was very gracious and charismatic... Oh, cool - he appears to be a really interesting person to talk to, so I think I'm envious... He's putting his team together quickly, as indeed he ought, given the gravity of multiple problems we face. Goodwill ought to help out a bit, as Rob's cites suggest, but it will certainly call for more than us 'shopping 'til we drop.' snort Debbi World Relief Maru http://flickr.com/photos/barackobamadotcom/sets/72157608716313371/ Lots of special comments for individual pics by viewers. Answering to my own post again.G http://change.gov/newsroom/entry/president_elect_obama_speaks_on_the_eve_of_this_election/ To all who opposed Obama, I invite you to watch his acceptance speech and then hold his feet to the fire if you detect any dissembling or variance from his stated goals. After all, we all elected him based on his rhetoric and it is only fair that we expect him to live up to it. I certainly would be disappointed and angry if he does not work to unify us and lead us to a better future. Side stories I'd like to share: I talked with my Mom the day after the election and she was deliriously excited about Obama's election and how it indicates a break from the past. In the course of our conversation she related several stories of her youth in which institutional racism played a role. Several of the stories were striking, but one made me very proud of her. When my Mom was a teenager, her family went to the neighborhood Baptist church. One Sunday the preacher was railing about how Niggers will never darken the door of this church. (An African-American family had moved into the neighborhood the week before.) My mother looked around and saw the church-goers nodding approval. So she gets up and leaves, and in the over 50 years since has only entered a Baptist church one time, and that was for a family wedding. The ironic twist is that the neighborhood is now all black and it is unlikely that any white people ever darken its door. The 50's are regarded by so many as some kind of golden age, but for many Americans it was a dark time filled with danger. People of African descent could be killed for little reason and with small hope of justice. And you know, it wasn't just bad for Blacks. This kind of xenophobic culture was harming anyone who was *not white*. It was how some were forced to live their lives, always wary of the white majority and their unwritten rules. My Mom used to ride the bus to work in downtown Houston. One day and old Black woman got on the bus, she was bent and gnarled, in more than just a little pain. My Mom stood up and offered her her seat. The woman glared at her with hatred and anger. It was several years before Mom understood, but the event stayed with her and came to mind often. My mom was sitting in the white section of the bus in the front (actually more like the middle), and her act of attempted kindness was no kindness at all. The old woman would likely been thrown off the bus had she accepted the seat. Events like these illustrate the true reason why Obama's presidency is so historic. We have come a long way with a distance to go before all citizens of our nation are fully empowered as equals. Certainly under the law we are equal, but culturally we suffer with division and inequity. I note that even at my job, when I talk to an African American about the election result, we tend to be careful about who's presence we are in. I see their furtive glances towards other whites and I get the sense they are glad to find a kindred soul in me, a white guy. Other times, I get the feeling that Blacks are reserved, as if unsure they can safely speak their mind to a white guy. (Not that they feel the potential for harm, but that they are unwilling to suffer the burning glance of someone's prejudice. Such things don't always roll off your back and some people are not inclined to have their day ruined by dwelling on hurtful things.) We still have a distance to travel. One of the things that appeals to me about Obama is that he is fearless in the face of these remaining prejudices and is determined to unite us in spite of them. Personally, I believe that even if Obama is just a mediocre president the majority of these small prejudices will starve away as people get used to the idea
Re: Undecided
- Original Message - From: John Williams [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Sunday, October 26, 2008 10:25 AM Subject: Re: Undecided Rceeberger [EMAIL PROTECTED] On 10/26/2008 8:39:29 AM, John Williams ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: Or to wonder how much poison is in the chicken. All chicken is poisoned. Hence how much?. Other questions include: Is it just enough poison to enhance the flavor but to make me sick to my stomach later? Or is my hair going to fall out and impotence soon follow? Perhaps it is actually methylenedioxymethamphetamine and the rape is coming a little later? Or is it a slow-acting poison that will gradually build up in my body to kill me long after the chicken is gone? The chicken contains just enough poison that no one gets everything they want. The taste is just good enough to remain edible to most people. xponent Spit Roasted Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: 'Heroes': Five Ways to Fix a Series In Crisis
- Original Message - From: Ronn! Blankenship [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, October 24, 2008 10:23 AM Subject: 'Heroes': Five Ways to Fix a Series In Crisis http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20235213,00.html?iid=top25-20081024-%27Heroes%27%3A+Five+ways+to+fix+it Heroes used to be the most surprising show on TV. Now it's become painfully predictable. Huh? Who predicted Arthur Petrelli and his power? I've been laying criticism on Heroes since the middle of the first season, mainly for trying to please the shippers. But most of this is missing the mark. xponent Past Future Tense Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: 'Heroes': Five Ways to Fix a Series In Crisis
- Original Message - From: Ronn! Blankenship [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, October 24, 2008 6:48 PM Subject: Re: 'Heroes': Five Ways to Fix a Series In Crisis At 06:45 PM Friday 10/24/2008, Charlie Bell wrote: On 25/10/2008, at 10:01 AM, xponentrob wrote: - Original Message - From: Ronn! Blankenship [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, October 24, 2008 10:23 AM Subject: 'Heroes': Five Ways to Fix a Series In Crisis http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20235213,00.html?iid=top25-20081024-%27Heroes%27%3A+Five+ways+to+fix+it Heroes used to be the most surprising show on TV. Now it's become painfully predictable. Huh? snip spoiler ROB Leave some spoiler space! Some of us don't get to see this stuff 'til quite a while after it's on in the States. Even though it's fasttracked and shown only a couple of weeks after the US airdate these days, I'm a full season behind 'cause I missed a load through work running late and I hate picking up a season half way through. And the UK - forget it, 'cause if you don't have satellite TV or cable, and many don't, it takes a year or more to appear on terrestrial tv. You could watch it on-line. Well.IIRC NBC blocks non-USAians from viewing online. I suppose you could find a pirate site to view Heroes, but no one here would do that now would they.G xponent Heard It From A Canadian Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: 'Heroes': Five Ways to Fix a Series In Crisis
- Original Message - From: Ronn! Blankenship [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, October 24, 2008 9:08 PM Subject: Re: 'Heroes': Five Ways to Fix a Series In Crisis At 08:43 PM Friday 10/24/2008, xponentrob wrote: - Original Message - From: Ronn! Blankenship [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, October 24, 2008 6:48 PM Subject: Re: 'Heroes': Five Ways to Fix a Series In Crisis At 06:45 PM Friday 10/24/2008, Charlie Bell wrote: On 25/10/2008, at 10:01 AM, xponentrob wrote: - Original Message - From: Ronn! Blankenship [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, October 24, 2008 10:23 AM Subject: 'Heroes': Five Ways to Fix a Series In Crisis http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20235213,00.html?iid=top25-20081024-%27Heroes%27%3A+Five+ways+to+fix+it Heroes used to be the most surprising show on TV. Now it's become painfully predictable. Huh? snip spoiler ROB Leave some spoiler space! Some of us don't get to see this stuff 'til quite a while after it's on in the States. Even though it's fasttracked and shown only a couple of weeks after the US airdate these days, I'm a full season behind 'cause I missed a load through work running late and I hate picking up a season half way through. And the UK - forget it, 'cause if you don't have satellite TV or cable, and many don't, it takes a year or more to appear on terrestrial tv. You could watch it on-line. Well.IIRC NBC blocks non-USAians from viewing online. I didn't realize that. Of course, I also found it interesting that of the . . . um . . . five broadcast networks I have tried to watch on-line, all but one work only on IE, while the other seems to work only on Firefox. Wanna guess which one the last is? (Hint: it's the only one associated by name with the creators of IE . . . ) If you mean NBC, it works with IE for me. Has anyone here tried out Chrome yet? Fairly nifty. xponent Just Browsing Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: The Seven Warning Signs of Bogus Science
- Original Message - From: Andrew Crystall [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs DDavid Brin et al Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Sunday, October 12, 2008 2:40 PM Subject: Re: The Seven Warning Signs of Bogus Science On 12 Oct 2008 at 12:00, Rceeberger wrote: http://chronicle.com/free/v49/i21/21b02001.htm * The article's from 1993. Also, there's a major problem with calling the EM Engine, as it stands, entirely bogus. Because there's a demonstration version the scientists behind it have built which generates thrust. I haven't seen any good explinations for that between It can't happen and It's an EM Engine. Got any evidence it actually works? I can't find any. xponent Science Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Gotta get me a digeridoo
- Original Message - From: Julia Thompson [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, October 10, 2008 10:39 AM Subject: Re: Gotta get me a digeridoo On Fri, 10 Oct 2008, Bruce Bostwick wrote: I have to wonder how many Scoutmasters would be dreading the release of didjeridus and Humanatones among that large an assembly of kids, however well disciplined. It's sort of in same category as giving the electronic-noisemaker toy to the child of a not-particularly-well- liked relative simply out of spite.. :D And then there's the well-meaning relative who gives the electronic-noisemaker to the child just because it seemed like a good idea in the store. ::headdesk:: ::headdesk:: ::headdesk:: Well meaning? It was justifiable revenge on my brothers and sisters I tell you!! xponent The Louder The Better Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: More on the meltdown
http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2008/09/kron-4-5-pm-sun.html Former brinneller Brad speaks up. xponent In The News Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Meltdown
- Original Message - From: Julia Thompson [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Thursday, September 25, 2008 9:00 AM Subject: Re: Meltdown On Wed, 24 Sep 2008, John Williams wrote: xponentrob [EMAIL PROTECTED] There's lots about this list and the people on it you know nothing about. A lot of history here in over a decade. So I don't owe you 10 bucks? Eh, if you do, I'll cover it. It'll give me an excuse to see the guy if I insist on delivering it in person. :) I insist on that occurrence being a freebie. :-) xponent Tween Friends Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Meltdown
- Original Message - From: Dave Land [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Thursday, September 25, 2008 10:53 AM Subject: Re: Meltdown On Sep 25, 2008, at 2:10 AM, Rceeberger wrote: On 9/24/2008 11:17:26 PM, John Williams ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: xponentrob [EMAIL PROTECTED] There's lots about this list and the people on it you know nothing about. A lot of history here in over a decade. So I don't owe you 10 bucks? No There is a lot about pop culture you don't know about either apparently. He wasn't alone in that: I never heard of Lobby Lud or the snowclone you employed in comparing John to Eric. You probably don't remember Hotblack DeSoto, even though I mentioned him on this list a time or two, either. I've always enjoyed sharing some of the fringy stuff I run across. I don't think I am alone in that. I see a lot of cross pollination from the various peripheries here from time to time. xponent Mudkips Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Meltdown
- Original Message - From: David Hobby [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2008 7:15 PM Subject: Re: Meltdown Rceeberger wrote: On 9/24/2008 1:36:39 PM, John Williams ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: David Hobby [EMAIL PROTECTED] I'm already at the stage where I delete many of your posts unread. I hope you continue to do so, if that is what you think is best. I will continue to write as I think best. ... You are Eric Reuter and I demand my 10 bucks. xponent Rob-- Uh, he doesn't sound like Eric? There must be a reference here that I'm not getting... Of course not, he just behaves much like Eric did in the period just before he intersected with the big boot. I thought it an entertaining jape. xponent And The Dutch Incident Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Meltdown
- Original Message - From: John Williams [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2008 6:53 PM Subject: Re: Meltdown Rceeberger [EMAIL PROTECTED] You are Eric Reuter and I demand my 10 bucks. Huh? There's lots about this list and the people on it you know nothing about. A lot of history here in over a decade. xponent Acausal Reference Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Delurking Re: Vasectomy/ Overpopulation
Good to see you again Ticia! xponent Greetings Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Storm Aftermath
There are still a few houses standing on the Bolivar penesula. Out of thousands. And there were those who opted to stay through the storm. May fate be meciful to them. xponent The Humanity Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Storm watch
It is the tail end of the storm. Things are winding down. There are tree branchs and shredded trees everywhere I can see. A couple of hundred feet of wood fence is blown down. Several of the chimney covers were torn off the roofs of the buildings here. I have not seen any broken windows yet. Almost everyone in the Houston area has lost their electrical power and estimates are in the weeks for a total repair. I am one of a very few who still have power. In dowtown Houston, the JPMorgan/Chase Tower, the tallest office building west of the Mississippi lost almost every window on one face of the building. Video is astounding. http://www.maroonspoon.com/wx/ike.html Just turn the sound down on this link and view the destruction. As the day goes on more details will emerge. xponent Sighs And Relief Effort Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: 08:00 UTC
- Original Message - From: Julia Thompson [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2008 11:18 PM Subject: Re: 08:00 UTC On Wed, 10 Sep 2008, Rceeberger wrote: On 9/10/2008 9:09:27 PM, Julia Thompson ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: On Wed, 10 Sep 2008, xponentrob wrote: - Original Message - From: Ronn! Blankenship [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2008 3:05 AM Subject: 08:00 UTC 30 minutes after LHC startup and we still seem to be here . . . I'll get back to you after Saturday... http://www.stormpulse.com/ I was hanging out with some folks this evening, one of whom had a laptop and Weather Underground up, and it was fascinating seeing all the predictive stuff on that site. (I usually use NOAA, but wunderground has an interactive feature that combines prediction with Google Maps, which is pretty cool.) Yes! I've been hanging out on Wunderground most of this hurricane season. Lots of weather-wise people there (plus some interesting trolls) and more information than can be digested in just a few sittings. Jeff Masters' blog there is a jewel of a resource. ATM, I'm debating whether I should evac or not. It really depends on the storm track and how bad Ike gets. If I stay, I might shove a webcam out the window and cast the storm somewhere. xponent No Evac Called For My Area As Of Yet Maru rob Dunno if the guy who was showing it to me posts, but if you ever see something from Sodium or Captain Sodium, that's probably my buddy. An example of why I like Wunderground. From Jeff Masters' blog: http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/show.html Hurricane Ike is closing in on Texas, and stands poised to become one of the most damaging hurricanes of all time. Despite Ike's rated Category 2 strength, the hurricane is much larger and more powerful than Category 5 Katrina or Category 5 Rita. The storm surge from Ike could rival Katrina's, inundating a 200-mile stretch of coast from Galveston to Cameron, Louisiana with waters over 15 feet high. This massive storm surge is due to the exceptional size of Ike. According to the latest wind field estimate (Figure 1), the diameter of Ike's tropical storm and hurricane force winds are 550 and 240 miles, respectively. For comparison, Katrina numbers at landfall were 440 and 210 miles, respectively. As I discussed in yesterday's blog entry, a good measure of the storm surge potential is Integrated Kinetic Energy (IKE). Ike continues to grow larger and has intensified slightly since yesterday, and the hurricane's Integrated Kinetic Energy has increased from 134 to 149 Terajoules. This is 30% higher than Katrina's total energy at landfall. All this extra energy has gone into piling up a vast storm surge that will probably be higher than anything in recorded history along the Texas coast. Storm surge heights of 20-25 feet are possible from Galveston northwards to the Louisiana border. The Texas storm surge record is held by Hurricane Carla of 1961. Carla was a Category 4 hurricane with 145 mph winds at landfall, and drove a 10 foot or higher storm surge to a 180-mile stretch of Texas coast. A maximum storm surge of 22 feet was recorded at Port Lavaca, Texas. I'm bunkered in with my cats and networking with the neighbors (Apt manager and hubby) in order to protect other neighbors and property. We are at 30' above sea level here and are sufficiently boarded up. Got a small generator to help make it through the first days of the aftermath. We expect less than 90 mph winds at this location http://www.maroonspoon.com/wx/ike.html is a good place to watch our local coverage. Just turn down the sound on the windows you are not watching. Galveston is really getting hammered already in an event of Katrina-like proportions. The whole island is likely to go underwater during the storm. Fortunately, I am no longer at the location I was during Rita (as some may recall, I was across the road from NASA-JSC) and my former residence is very likely to be inundated in the storm surge. Catastrophists are predicting a storm much like the 1900 Galveston hurricane, at least with regard to its destructive potential. It is predicted that Ike will be the most destructive storm in history (dollar wise),and if one adds into the calculations the destruction wrought upon Haiti and Cuba and the other Caribbean islands, it already is. The Galveston 1900 storm killed 6000-8000 people and I don't expect such an outcome in human cost, but the massive storm surge is likely to destroy a good bit of coastal habitations and infrastructure. For those so inclined, please pray for the coastal people of Texas and Louisiana that their suffering is tolerable. Will check in occasionally as power allows. xponent High Ground Maru rob
Re: 08:00 UTC
- Original Message - From: Julia Thompson [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Friday, September 12, 2008 5:29 PM Subject: Re: 08:00 UTC On Fri, 12 Sep 2008, Julia Thompson wrote: On Fri, 12 Sep 2008, xponentrob wrote: Hurricane Ike is closing in on Texas, and stands poised to become one of the most damaging hurricanes of all time. Despite Ike's rated Category 2 strength, the hurricane is much larger and more powerful than Category 5 Katrina or Category 5 Rita. The storm surge from Ike could rival Katrina's, inundating a 200-mile stretch of coast from Galveston to Cameron, Louisiana with waters over 15 feet high. This massive storm surge is due to the exceptional size of Ike. According to the latest wind field estimate (Figure 1), the diameter of Ike's tropical storm and hurricane force winds are 550 and 240 miles, respectively. For comparison, Katrina numbers at landfall were 440 and 210 miles, respectively. As I discussed in yesterday's blog entry, a good measure of the storm surge potential is Integrated Kinetic Energy (IKE). Ike continues to grow larger and has intensified slightly since yesterday, and the hurricane's Integrated Kinetic Energy has increased from 134 to 149 Terajoules. This is 30% higher than Katrina's total energy at landfall. All this extra energy has gone into piling up a vast storm surge that will probably be higher than anything in recorded history along the Texas coast. Storm surge heights of 20-25 feet are possible from Galveston northwards to the Louisiana border. The Texas storm surge record is held by Hurricane Carla of 1961. Carla was a Category 4 hurricane with 145 mph winds at landfall, and drove a 10 foot or higher storm surge to a 180-mile stretch of Texas coast. A maximum storm surge of 22 feet was recorded at Port Lavaca, Texas. OK, I'm going to do one more thing that *has* to be done before 5:30, and then I'm going to start hauling toys furniture into the garage. The last thing I need is something thrown through a window again. OK, besides having things thrown through the window, I really didn't need to re-injure myself. (I strained a muscle in my side on Saturday, it seemed to be better, I helped move a couch this afternoon and then started really feeling it long about the second trip to the garage. I still brought in more than half of everything that might get thrown through a window, but my wonderful husband is going to take care of the rest. I'll help if he asks for assistance with the biggest item, though.) Be careful and good luck Julia! You might get some strong winds Saturday or Sunday, so it is a good thing you are removing potential projectiles. xponent Anti-Ballistics Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: 08:00 UTC
- Original Message - From: Ronn! Blankenship [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2008 3:05 AM Subject: 08:00 UTC 30 minutes after LHC startup and we still seem to be here . . . I'll get back to you after Saturday... http://www.stormpulse.com/ xponent In For A Blow Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Sarah Palin
- Original Message - From: Dan M [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion' brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Saturday, August 30, 2008 4:26 PM Subject: RE: Sarah Palin -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Olin Elliott Sent: Saturday, August 30, 2008 3:12 PM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: Re: Sarah Palin The environmental groups are going to go after Palin hard. She has supported drilling in sensitive wildlife areas and she allowed (even sanctioned) the use of airplanes to slaughter wolves in Alaska last year. See this, which came out yesterday from Defenders of Wildlife: http://www.defendersactionfund.org/http://www.defendersactionfund.org/ With all due respect, so what? Most people prefer drilling everywhere over $4.00 gasoline. And, the Republicans are winning that argument...the polls show a massive preference now to drill to bring down the prices. Her main risk for McCain is that she's very inexperienced on the national stage. She may say something that makes her look like one of the not ready for prime time players. No matter what one thinks about Obama, he's been around the rough and tumble of Chicago for years and has won against the Clinton machine. His speech last Thursday got plaudits from Romney's former advisor and he looks like the most ready Democrat to fight since Bill. He will make more mistakes, as will McCainbut Palin may make a laughingstock of herself. I am very interested in talking with my mother-in-law about this. She was one of the older women who thought there was sexist coverage favoring Obama. My guess is she'll laugh off Palin's pick as weak. Palin is a Hail Mary pass for the Republicans. Most don't work. But, every once in a while, to use another analogy, one wins the big pot by drawing to an inside straight. So, we'll have to stay tuned. This is making the rounds on the net ATM, and addresses pretty much what Dan is talking about: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrG8w4bb3kg Some conservatives forget the mike is still on and say what they really think about Palin. xponent Newsworthy Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Sore losers
- Original Message - From: William T Goodall [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Brin-L brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Tuesday, August 26, 2008 7:36 PM Subject: Sore losers So why are the Americans counting total medals instead of golds for the olympics? Before the games started there were some arguments about predicted medal counts, with most experts predicting pretty much exactly what happened and a few others predicting Americans winning more gold than China. What you are seeing is probably related to the majority razzing the dissenters (for being too nationalistic as I am hearing it). And why the innuendo about Usain Bolt as long as he's clean? Heh.the last few Olympics have been marred by drug scandals. IIRC Johnson was stripped of medals (and records) and there was a good deal of discussion about Carl Lewis and whether he was clean. What I am hearing is a great deal of praise and awe of Bolt who was just plain amazing in the 100 and 200. The drug situation is constant news over here in a variety of sports..even professional (fake) wrestling. (I refer you to the stories about Chris Benoit) It is pretty much an obsession over here. And the manufactured fuss about miming during the opening ceremony when everybody does it during these kind of events (the Australians admitted they did it at Sydney). In general, I think people recognize that the Beijing opening ceremonies were a feat that is not likely to be repeated anytime soon. Too big, too lavish, too over the top for anyone else to invest so much again. But the purported message the Chinese wished to send and their actual implimentation are at odds. The message was of unity between the diverse ethnic groups of China, but all those ethnic groups were portrayed by Hans, and given the American experience with racism and prejudice, it smacks of rank hypocrisy. (We claim to be against such things) And the 'not real sports' jibes about table tennis, rhythmic gymnastics and others? I suppose it just generally flows that some games will never be considered sports by some. If I were getting paid (or subsidized) to play Monopoly or Team Fortress, I would expect to hear similar arguments. Beach Volleyball Rules Maru Pretty intense innit? xponent Lack Of Protests Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Hello
- Original Message - From: Jon Gabriel [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Tuesday, June 10, 2008 11:14 AM Subject: Hello Just thought I'd poke my head in and say hello. Have been skimming the archives in my perma-lurker email account for the past few days. I'm happy to see that the list seems a lot less drama-prone than it was three years ago. :) So what's new with everyone? Since everyone seems to be afraid of youG, I start it off. First, it is good to see you again Jon! Not much has changed round here, but I am involved in protesting a criminal cult that calls itself a religion. Frequently. xponent I Hear You Like Mudkips Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: USA Presidential Race
- Original Message - From: John Garcia [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion brin-l@mccmedia.com Sent: Monday, June 09, 2008 9:04 AM Subject: Re: USA Presidential Race On Fri, Jun 6, 2008 at 3:13 PM, Alberto Monteiro [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: John Garcia wrote: Now that it looks like it's McCain vs. Obama (listed in alphabetical order) I was wondering what you all think of this matchup. I'm especially interested in what our friends from outside of the USA think. Here in Brazil it seems that McCain will easily win, and that Obama is like a fringe candidate, just there to prove that Dems aren't racist bigots (and Hillary was there just to prove the non-sexism). Alberto Monteiro ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l Hmmm. That's interesting. Last summer, someone asked me who I thought would be the next President and I replied Some rich white guy. Now that I've heard Obama, I do think that he has a very good chance of being elected. Just how many voters will either vote for McCain or stay home is unknown. Not very many people are willing to give what may be seen as a racist answer to pollsters. Having said that, Obama may have attracted enough new voters to offset the bigots. It'll be something to watch. In 2004 I posted about this new guy named Barack Obama, something about how he was an up and comer and the kind of guy I wanted to be President. (At least I know I've been saying all that in a lot of places throughout the last 4 years.) It's in the archives somewhere. xponent 2004 DNC Maru rob ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
