Re: Re: Prius hybrids selling at a premium
From: Stephen A. Lawrence [EMAIL PROTECTED] And social security, which is, what -- 7.5%? Don't forget that. Social security is 15.5% as any self-employed person knows. Corporations are required to pay half of their employees SS tax.
Re: Prius hybrids selling at a premium
Stephen A. Lawrence wrote: And please note that Jed's income numbers stopped at $116,666. If you look at larger incomes . . . No, that is the average for the top 20% of the U.S. That's everyone, including Bill Gates. This data was from several years ago (not sure when). The amounts for all 5 groups has gone up since then. The top 20% has increased the most. - Jed
Re: Gas Tax
When are people going to stop complaining and arguing and actually DO SOMETHING about energy. The following was a reasonable starting point when posted here over two years ago, and it is still a good way to use the modest gas tax proposed, or even a much larger gas tax, which is now much more appropriate as precious years have been frittered away and the situation is much worse: http://tinyurl.com/7eqju Regards, Horace Heffner
Thanks from Peter Gluck
May I ask you to tell at Vortex that I am grateful to those who answered and I understnad those who didn't. CF is socomplex and I even have not asked why it is not reproducible
Re: BLP implementation path
Mike Carrell writes: My point in the essay is that wind and solar have well known problems, and hydrogen storage and distribution on the scale necessary to sustain our present lifestyle is not attractive. However, BLP technologies offer a way forward which can work along with hydrogen produced from wind and solar sources. Point taken. Wind and solar sure do have problems. Anyone who seriously advocates them, as I do, should acknowledge this. In many ways uranium fission would be better, especially with a next generation reactor. And if BLP can be made to work, I would be the first to agree it is even more promising than CF, in both the short term and long term. This is a strange analogy, but as I see it, the energy crisis resembles a frightening fatal illness, such as AIDS. Wind and solar are analogous to AZT and other viricides: they can bring us back to health and probably let us live out a natural life, but they will be very expensive and restrictive. We will have to put up with wind turbines everywhere you turn. We will never have HUGE amounts of energy for desalination megaprojects or projects put all highways underground. Energy will remain expensive forever. Something like BLP (or CF) on the other hand, would be like a magic cure for AIDS. Not only will it work overnight and kill every last virus, it will also restore the patient to the very peak of health at age 18; it will give him the strength of ten men; permanently remove the need for sleep, and give him X-ray vision and the ability to read two books simultaneously while driving a car and singing an aria. The only conventional energy source that offers the same kind of unlimited power and incredible capablities that BLP or CF offer is spaced-based solar. I guess that would be solar-to-microwave, in the latest incarnation. (Right?) And as I see it, the only way to get that is with a space elevator. I wish the people in Washington would take that seriously, instead of chasing off after expeditions to Mars. I wish they would ditch the International Space Station and get on with elevators instead. - Jed
Another Challenge/ was RE: Gas Tax
Hi Horace, Well, lets see. I've spent a better part of my adult life trying to do something about this. Early on, my mentor and I founded a 501(c)(3) to fund our work in the new energy technologies. The response from donors was this is commercial, go to the VC's. The response from the VC's were, what can you do by next quarter? Needless to say, but for an angel or two, it was hardly worth the airplane tickets. So I go to Wall St, and do the corporate thing for a few years to build a war chest. The 90's were a good time for that you know, after the disastrous leadership of Clinton, an 8 year economic boom made some actual money float around, and you saw that reflected in the people here and the discussion. So I could fund my own work, and things progressed. Sadly, the last 5 years of fiscally sound policy of our current leaders has produced an unending war for oil, an economy still in the toilet, with no signs of real recovery ( and did any of you really believe that trickle down theory crap? Even Reagan's advisors backed away from that one. ) Can't make much progress when the fishing hole is drying up, you know. Let's add to this, that real success is going to mean _giving_ the results away to the very people who created this debacle, and you can see the problem. Look, about 4 feet from where I sit writing software, a mountain of lab equipment and technology sits largely idle. Sure, it's a passion of mine, nothing is going to stop me from working, but the occasional stolen hours do not add up to much by each years end. The truly pathetic thing is how little money it takes to keep the work going, for the cost some of my wealthy friends spend on golf course memberships I could be doing this full time and making real progress. But the ugly truth is, NO ONE WANTS THIS. Let that one sink in, Horace. Everyone pays lips service, but when it comes right down to it, NO ONE WANTS THIS. You can't have a society based on selfishness and greed and expect much else. Posting grandiose plans for publicly funded energy research is just so much crap, frankly. I know you mean well, but do you think that what you are saying hasn't been said by 100's before you? Common sense and a recitation of the facts is not going to get the job done. Forget the politicians, they're too busy jamming feeding tubes down vegetables throats fighting to impress Thomas Malloy for his vote. Don't look to these folks for the answer, or even benign neglect. They're also part of the problem. I don't expect any handouts. I do what I do because it's my passion, I love to do research. And if someone believes that the future can be better and that parting with some pocket change can make it happen, I'll crank up another 501(c)(3) and things will in fact happen again. For now, it's the snails pace and ~100 troops a month dead in the desert. Sorry for ranting, but perhaps it's time for some of these truths to be uttered in public. It's not like I have anything to lose, 'cos it's not like anyone's got the balls to put some money on the table for this stuff. Some folks say that individuals can't make a difference. Bullshit. Individuals are the _only_ ones that ever make a difference. K. -Original Message- From: Horace Heffner [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, April 15, 2005 2:36 PM To: vortex-l@eskimo.com Subject: Re: Gas Tax When are people going to stop complaining and arguing and actually DO SOMETHING about energy. The following was a reasonable starting point when posted here over two years ago, and it is still a good way to use the modest gas tax proposed, or even a much larger gas tax, which is now much more appropriate as precious years have been frittered away and the situation is much worse: http://tinyurl.com/7eqju Regards, Horace Heffner
Nobody wants it is what Martin says, too
Keith Nagel makes a cri de coeur: the work going, for the cost some of my wealthy friends spend on golf course memberships I could be doing this full time and making real progress. But the ugly truth is, NO ONE WANTS THIS. Let that one sink in, Horace. Everyone pays lips service, but when it comes right down to it, NO ONE WANTS THIS. You can't have a society based on selfishness and greed and expect much else. Martin Fleischmann has told me the same sort of thing. People don't want progress, and they shan't have it. They don't want to be bothered. I admire, like, and respect Martin immensely, but with all due respect, I think history shows he is wrong. Here are two vivid examples of what I have in mind: you can find hundreds more. In 1844, Congress voted to fund the first large-scale outdoor test of the telegraph. After months of difficult work, many changes of plan, and some vital improvements and discoveries by Ezra Cornell, it was finally built. There was a ceremony with a brass band. An adorable little girl got to choose the first message. Everyone applauded and went home. What happened next is, to the modern mind, astounding. Nothing happened! During the first few weeks the telegraph was in operation, exactly one customer used it for a lark, paying one cent. A few other customers trickled in. After a few months, Congress decided it was a waste of the taxpayer’s money, and as I recall they wrote it off and gave it to Cornell and others for pennies on the dollar. People had no idea how they might use a telegraph, because they had never experienced one. It did not occur to them that knowing what is happing in Baltimore at this moment might be useful, or that there might be some advantage to sendin! g news to an associate in Baltimore in minutes instead of hours or days. Finally, months later, businessmen began to use it for things like stock quotes and shipping notices. Then a line was strung from Baltimore to New York, and news from Wall Street and the Gold Exchange became available instantly. THEN the telegraph took off like a rocket, and within a few years there were thousands of kilometers of lines, and Western Union was one of the largest, richest corporations on earth. Example 2, From an unpublished essay I wrote: The Myth That the Rich Jump In In 1860, Theodore Dehone Judah tried to raise money to build a railroad from California through the Rocky Mountains and across the Great Plains, the final link of the great transcontinental railroad. Judah was one of the greatest railroad designers in the United States. At that time railroads were undergoing the biggest economic boom in history. Judah was in San Francisco, one of the richest cities on earth, where gold field millionaires sometimes gambled away hundreds of thousands of dollars in an evening. . . . The Government was also concerned about cementing the bonds of trade, communication and loyalty with California, to keep it in the Union camp. It was anxious, because the State had many Southern emigrants, and Lincoln had barely carried it. The Republican party platform stressed that “a railroad to the Pacific Ocean is imperatively demanded by the interests of the whole country... the Federal Government ought to render immediate and efficient aid in its constructi! on.” You might imagine that in a city chock full with millionaires, at the height of railroad boom, with a green light from the government, Judah would have no trouble attracting capital. You would be wrong. After months of effort, he had managed to raise $6,230 for a project that everyone knew would take tens of millions. One observer noted that “the project was thoroughly saturated and fairly dripping with elements of adventure and romance.” If it succeeded, it would surely be one of the most profitable ventures in history. Yet, not a single San Francisco businessman took the plans seriously. . . . I realize it seems astonishing, but the fact is, most people simply do not grasp what cold fusion is or how it might fix our problems. It isn't that they DON'T WANT IT; they just don't get it. They have no idea what they want! They respond the way the engineers and execs did at a computer company where I demonstrated one of the first microcomputers in the late 1970s: That's a neat toy, but what's the point? What can you do with it? It has no hard disk. It is a thousand times slower than our smallest machine. (That is how the CEO of DEC reacted, too. DEC was the second largest computer company in the world but within a few year it went out of business, as did the company where I demonstrated the microcomputer.) Some people agree that CF might be real pay lip service to it, and they repeat what was written in the newspapers in 1989 about “miracles” and “clean energy.” But it does not sink in. When you talk to them, you see that they honestly cannot tell why CF would ! be much different or better than drilling for oil in
Re: Prius hybrids selling at a premium
--- Terry Blanton [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: $27k to $32k depending on location and political preference. :-) http://tinyurl.com/63t3m Bleah. I don't make enough to even begin to afford that. Most people out there drive used cars because they cannot afford a new one. Much less something like this. I'm wondering what the road salt is going to do to electrical windings in hybrid/electric vehicles driven here in Buffalo NY over time. --Kyle __ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Small Business - Try our new resources site! http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/resources/
Re: Prius hybrids selling at a premium
Terry Blanton wrote: $27k to $32k depending on location and political preference. :-) http://tinyurl.com/63t3m What do you mean $27,000? It says the base price is $21,000 or $19,000. (What does MSRP mean?) Plus you should get airbags for another $560. All the other stuff in packages 2 through 6 seems useless to me. I did not get a radio with my car, and if I lived in NY, I would not bother with airconditioning. Who needs 'em? If you must hear music, get a $20 Wall-Mart boom box. It ain't worth seven grand! Where do you get $32,000? Maybe I am missing something here. I have not bought many cars. - Jed
Re: Prius hybrids selling at a premium
Terry explained to me that they can sell cars for more than the list price. I did not know that. It shows how little I know about cars. I suppose these high prices are caused by a shortage. They are planning to increase production, which should bring the price back down to the list price. Right? I have never paid anything but the list price for a car. - Jed
FW: WHAT'S NEW Friday, April 15, 2005
[Original Message] From: What's New [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Akira Kawasaki [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: 4/15/2005 12:37:30 PM Subject: WHAT'S NEW Friday, April 15, 2005 WHAT'S NEW Robert L. Park Friday, 15 Apr 05 Washington, DC 1. KANSAS: AAAS TURNS DOWN AN INVITATION TO DEBATE EVOLUTION. Last Friday, the Kansas State Department of Education invited the American Association for the Advancement of Science to provide expert opinion regarding the mainstream scientific view of the nature of science, at a hearing on evolution. Drawing from the Santorum report language accompanying the No Child left Behind Act, the invitation says the curriculum should help students understand the full range of scientific views that exist. Of course. The problem is that there is only one scientific view of the origin of species: Darwin's natural selection. The hearing will be nothing but elaborately staged theater, with intelligent designers portrayed as scientists. The AAAS CEO, Alan Leshner, quite properly declined, We see no purpose in debating a matter of faith. Neither does WN. But wait, isn't this the same Alan Leshner who defends the AAAS Dialog on Science, Ethics and Religion? In an editorial in the 11 Feb 05 issue of Science, Leshner argued that getting together with religious leaders to discuss the relation of scientific advances to other belief systems is helpful http://www.aps.org/WN/WN05/wn021105.cfm. 2. EPHEDRA: FEDERAL JUDGE IN UTAH LIFTS THE FDA BAN ON EPHEDRA. In 1998 WN exposed Vitamin O as ordinary salt water. The FDA was barred from taking action because salt water is a natural supplement. Later that year a UCSF study reported serious side effects from ephedra http://www.aps.org/WN/WN98/wn112798.cfm. Sold on the web as herbal ecstacy, the FDA said ephedra, was also protected by the Dietary Supplement and Health Education Act (DSHEA). It's estimated that there are more adverse reactions to ephedra than all other herbal supplements combined, but not until a young major league pitcher became a victim did the FDA ban it http://www.aps.org/WN/WN04/wn010204.cfm. Ephedra was the only supplement banned since passage of DSHEA. Now there are none. The judge lifted the ban because the FDA had not determined a safe level. The FDA had not determined a safe level because it would be unethical to test a substance on people if it's known to be harmful. Once again there are calls to change DSHEA. 3. HOMEOPATHY AT 250: THE POWER OF MEDICINE THAT DOES NO HARM. My mail box has been crammed full of homeopathy stuff all week. Sunday was the 250th birthday of Samuel Hahnemann, the German physician who founded homeopathy in an age of purging and blood- letting. Hahnemann's law of similars would be a disaster, he not come up with his law of infinitesimals. His diaper rash cure, for example, is rhus toxicodendron (poison ivy). Lucky for baby, the law of infinitesimals says to dilute it 200C, i.e. there isn't any. We excuse Hahnemann, who didn't have Avogadro's number (neither did Avogadro, it was determined 50 years later), but homeopaths know it, which goes beyond stupid. And homeopathy has its own DSHEA. In 1938 Senator Royal Copeland, a homeopath, exempted homeopathy from the Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act. After all, it would be like trying to show holy water had been blessed. THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND. Opinions are the author's and not necessarily shared by the University of Maryland, but they should be. --- Archives of What's New can be found at http://www.aps.org To subscribe, send a blank e-mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Npbody wants it is what Martin says,too
Jed, Your post is whats called a reality based observation because its so true and real. Mentioning DEC brought back some of the 1970's to me. We bought our first "computer" in 1972, a DEC PDP-8L. Plan was to use it in a design study and demo for bidding a portion of a North Sea project for a crude oil metering/ proving station. " Splat" !!! went the idea because the senior instrument people at Phillips were old timers that grew up using pneumatic instrumentation and considered electronics something out of a Mad magazine. Alas, Digital went the way of all flesh, later folded into Compaq and disappeared somewhere between the water cooler and the elevator in Compaq Center Houston. Ironic that HP did the same for Compaq. A nation that rises like the US, hasbeen gifted with men ofenergetic inspiration, The average age of a democratic form of a republic is never more than 200 years. It is interesting to speculate " where" in the world the next burst of energy will arise. I considered China as the next powerhouse but have tabled that thought because China lack the essential for greatness due to it being mired in socialism likethe USA. Surprisingly, it may come again to the USA with its seething discontent over the Iraq war and the political regime that has captured Washington. These operators areDems or Repsdepending on the weather.It will take some radical events to trigger such an event which is looming as we watch with energy , banking and dont forget Wall Street. It is possible that if the Dow, Nasdeq and SP fallbelow a trip point, say below 10,000 ( Dow) we may see some interesting buttons pushed. The last time it dropped below that figure I had a real concern they wouldn't be able to stop it until it fell into the 3500 range. This time around my intuition is screaming.. They better not let it fall below 9000 over the next 90 day or June 30 reports may cause a slide nobody on earth wants. China is doing their part to prop it but with the bunch we have doing the thinking and leading for us.. I wouldn't count on China. Richard Blank Bkgrd.gif
Re: BLP implementation path
(Jed, any idea why the reply field on your message come through pointing to you, not Vortex?) Jed Rothwell wrote: The only conventional energy source that offers the same kind of unlimited power and incredible capablities that BLP or CF offer is spaced-based solar. I guess that would be solar-to-microwave, in the latest incarnation. (Right?) Um -- I can't comment on the _latest_ incarnation, but I can say that the earliest version of space-based energy systems I'm aware of was indeed solar-to-microwave. The trouble with that is the antenna farms at the receptor end, and the downlink energy density. That's always been the trouble with it: with very low energy density in the downlink, it's safe, but you need enormous antenna farms to collect it (think solar energy: at low power densities the beam energy density will be comparable to sunlight). At high beam power densities you have a problem finding a spot for the beam that won't affect people or animals. From what I've read, hazards of stray microwaves seem more significant now than they did back in 1976 and opposition to high-intensity downlinks would probably be even stronger now than it would have been then. 30 years ago nobody had a clue how microwaves could possibly cause damage to living creatures, save by cooking them, so they were generally considered completely safe. As I recall, some time in the last decade it was finally determined that non-ionizing radiation _can_ affect chemical processes about which living things care, and the idea of a microwave downlink in somebody's back yard no longer seems so jolly. And as I see it, the only way to get that is with a space elevator. Or an L-5 colony, which, I seem to recall, was the original planned platform for putting the SSPS units in place :-) But then, how do you get the colony in place without an elevator? Uh Some of the ideas for collecting solar power from that era were kind of cool, actually. For a cheap mirror, for instance, you take a big blob of liquid plastic (melted or not polymerized yet, whatever) and blow a bubble in it. If you do it right, you can make the bubble re-e-e-a-lly big -- like a kilometer or so across (vacuum and microgravity are supposed to make this easy). Then after it hardens, you cut a small hole in the bubble, zip to the middle, drop a thermite bomb there, and leave before it goes off. The bomb goes off, aluminum and iron vapor go whizzing off in all directions only to be stopped by the plastic film, and Shazam, you have an aluminized (or iron-ized?) plastic sphere a kilometer across. Now carefully cut it in half, and separate the two hemispheres. Now you have the mirrors to build two solar furnaces, each a kilometer in diameter, and the material cost was almost nothing. Granted the mirrors aren't very good -- wicked spherical abberation -- but for solar concentration they're just fine. I wish the people in Washington would take that seriously, instead of chasing off after expeditions to Mars. I wish they would ditch the International Space Station and get on with elevators instead. I dunno if an elevator will ever work, but I agree about the ISS -- a cash sink of that magnitude without an obvious purpose isn't doing anyone any good. It was scaled back so much that NASA itself said it should be scrapped rather than pursued at the current level, but it didn't happen (this was ~10 years ago; wish I could remember the quote). If we can't have an elevator, then even a sensible space plane would be better than what we've got now. Mars won't happen, anyway -- it's another of those wonderful unfunded projects of the current administration. All the big expenses are pushed to the future and little or no actual cash is disbursed in the present. But it sounds good in a speech. - Jed
Re: BLP implementation path
In reply to Horace Heffner's message of Thu, 14 Apr 2005 22:27:09 -0800: Hi, [snip] At 3:15 PM 4/14/5, Mike Carrell wrote: In the current discussion of a post-peak-oil world, the usual alternatives have been worked over thoroughly, and found unsatisfactory. Found unsatisfactory by whom? You must have been on another list. There are plenty of promising renewable and conservation alternatives, enough to dramaticaly reduce the cost of energy in the fairly near future, and to eventually eliminate the use of carbon based fossil fuels. True, but these don't lead to access to the solar system, while evolution of energy dense solutions does. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk All SPAM goes in the trash unread.
