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| 2009/11/23-30 [Science/GlobalWarming] UID:53539 Activity:high |
11/22 What no chatter about the Climate Hack? MOTD, I'm so diappointed
\_ What is impressive about breaking onto an academic server? I
broke onto the Astronomy machines when I was a sophmore.
\_ Way to miss the point. The hack itself was not impressive.
The information that was exposed, however, make the above
thread kind of moot.
\_ No, it did not. Global warming is becoming more and more
obviously a real problem. There are still a few nutters
that claim that it isn't happening, but there are people
who don't believe in evolution either.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/1125/p02s01-usgn.html
\_ Keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better.
I'm going to continue eating imported wagyu beef and
leaving my PC on 24/7. I'm thinking about buying an SUV
next year.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/11/25/nigel_lawson
\_ You don't even have to be a scientist to see the obvious
effects of global warming anymore. Just look at the
rising sea levels, the shrinking polar ice caps, etc.
\_ Except that none of this is new. The poles
have been completely free of ice in the past,
for instance. I was reading an article about
icebergs as far north as New Zealand intended
to serve as a data point about global warming,
except that the article said that this last
happened in the 1920s. Was it global warming
then, too? I personally believe humans are
affecting the environment in a big way -
probably not a way that benefits us, but I am not
sure we can make that claim definitively as it's a
complicated system (maybe we are preventing the
Earth from cooling off too much). However, the
Earth has been warming and cooling for millions
of years and it's hard to separate the natural
effects from those we caused let alone predict the
consequences.
\_ Global warming is undeniable, and though there are
still many of people like you who try to deny
still many people like you who try to deny
the fact that the earth is warming, the
evidence is pretty overwhelming. It seems from
your statements above that you are backtracking
on your earlier insistence that those who see
this for what it is are blind zealots. The exact
causes are open for debate, though it seems
like human beings have at the very least some
impace on the climate.
impact on the climate. |
| 2009/11/23-12/2 [Transportation/Car/RoadHogs, Reference/RealEstate] UID:53540 Activity:moderate |
11/23 "Warming's impacts sped up, worsened since Kyoto"
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/sci_climate_09_post_kyoto
\_ what do you propose we average Joes do about climate warning?
Oh really? Yeah, exactly.
\_ Make life choices which reduce your carbon impact. Communicate
with your representatives that you consider this an important
and urgent issue. What else would average Joes do about
anything? -tom
\_ the average Joe will not give up his/her SUV and living
in suburbs and ex-urbs (which are the reasons that increase
our needs for energy).
\_ Some average Joe/Jane won't give up loving in suburbs
while willing to give up his/her SUV; Some average
Joe/Jane won't give his/her SUVs while willing to
telecommunte twice a week; some average Joe/Jane won't
telecommute while willing to become vegetarian; etc.
And, like you said, some average Joe/Jane won't give up
anything. Ideally, the problem can be very easily solved
by everyone giving up N things. But very few people in
the free world would be willing to do that. So we'll have
to rely on most people giving up 1 or 2 things out of their
own list of N things. (For me, I didn't give up living
in suburbs. But I wear a jacket at home in winter instead
of turning on the heat, use a fan in summer instead of AC,
line-dry my laundary in the backyard instead of using the
gas dryer, skip the plastic or paper bags when grocery-
shopping, gave up my SUV and got a Prius, and literally
dig through the household trash to find recyclable and
compostable items that my wife and in-laws fail to
separate out.) --- OP
\_ The average Joe will do whatever is effectively marketed
to him. SUVs and suburbs have been effectively marketed
to average Joes. We are starting to see better marketing
of environmental and quality-of-life issues, but we need
more. Also, we need to stop subsidizing carbon production,
which is where legislative action is needed; if the
suburb dwellers were paying the true cost of their
lifestyle, it would be much less attractive. -tom
\_ I get what you are saying, but this could be said
about any group. "Bike riders will do whatever is
effectively marketed to them". Otherwise the
marketing wouldn't have been effective. -- jwm
\_ That's a bit tautalogical, sure. But my
point is that the idea that everyone should
live in a big house in a faceless suburb
with two SUVs (or now, an SUV and a Prius)
is the result of 60 years of corporate
marketing, and corporations are really the
only beneficiaries. Just as corporate marketing
changed what the average Joe wanted, marketing
of social responsibility can change what the
average Joe wants. -tom
\_ I agree. The way we as a society have used
marketing has been damaging. --jwm
\_ I'm sorry, but I cannot agree that "corporations
are really the only beneficiaries." I really
like having land around my house. I use it to
grow food, for recreation, and for privacy. I
went to my coworkers ultra-chic condo which
cost over $1M and had koi and Italian fountains
everywhere, but I wouldn't care for living in
close quarters like he does. He even told me
he is looking for a single family home for
various reasons all related to the density of
the housing. You may think there's no benefit
to a SFR, but millions of Americans disagree
and that is how most Americans lived 200
years ago. I think that mixed-use/loft/high
density housing is something pushed on us by
corporations and SFR more closely reflects
the rural areas most Americans lived in prior
to the Industrial Revolution.
\_ Who said anything about condos? I live in
a house in a city (Oakland). -tom
\_ Plus the Richmond and Sunset Districts in
SF are also primarily houses. -- !PP
\_ So are Hancock Park and Beverly Hills
in LA, but most people can't afford
to live there. If they want a nice house
with land they have to leave the city.
\_ The complaint was against a "big house in a
faceless suburb." How can you possibly
argue that a big house in Oakland is
somehow superior to a big house in a
suburb like Lafayette? Same damn thing.
\_ 1) The house in Oakland is smaller.
2) The house in Oakland requires less
driving.
Pretty simple, really. -tom
\_ Neither of these are necessarily true.
\_ They are both true as averages.
-tom
\_ They don't _have_ to be.
These are external to the
idea of suburbs. You can
build smaller houses in
the suburbs. You can take
BART to SF from Lafayette
as surely as you can from
Oakland. One thing you _cannot_
do is build affordable SFR in a
city, which takes us back
to condos.
\_ You're right, if reality were
completely different than it
is, houses would be smaller
in Lafayette and people
in suburbs would drive less
than people in cities. But
on this planet, houses are
larger in suburbs and people
drive more. -tom
\_ I think you need to
focus on the problems
you are trying to
address and "suburbs"
and "housing density"
are not them. You can
live in the city and
drive a lot (reverse
commute, which some
people do) and you
can build a huge
energy sucking house
in the city, too, if
you are rich.
\_ I said "make life
choices that reduce
your carbon impact";
someone else asserted
that "average Joes"
would not give up
their SUVs in the
suburbs. I'm pointing
out that that assertion
is unfounded. -tom
\_ I think that most people want both the
advantages of density (short commutes, walkable
neighborhoods, more community) as well as lots
of space for themselves personally. Most people
just want more of everything, but the planet
cannot support this kind of lifestyle for
6 billion people. This is just a simple fact
of physics, not something that has anything
to do with corporations. The earth is probably
already past its carrying capacity, according
to many scientists.
\_ The idea that people should live in
identical large houses with large yards
and large fences, a long drive away
from the places they want to go, was
basically invented in the 50s by and
for corporations. Before that virtually
all development was mixed-use, and
our population was denser despite being
much smaller. From 1950 to 1990, Bay
Area population more than doubled,
while density actually decreased. Most
of that change was due to the construction
of freeways and related destruction of urban
neighborhoods, with housing moving from
urban, mixed-use to suburban and isolated.
Now things are starting to swing back the
other way, which is a good thing. Very
little of this has much to do with what
the average Joe wants, except insofar as
he's susceptible to marketing. -tom
\_ This is a lie. Like I said, before the
Industrial Revolution more people
than not lived in large houses with
large yards a long drive away from
\_ There was driving
before the Ind.
Rev.??
\_ certainly not
autos but I would
guess PP means horse
and buggy drives
town. The population was not denser
at all. This era you wax nostalgic for
was an artifact of the Industrial
Revolution where workers moved to slums
in large cities in order to work in
factories. It's laughable that you think
that corporations in the 1950s invented
the suburban lifestyle. What corporations
invented was *DENSE CITIES*. From
1950 to 1990 what we saw was _AN
IMPROVED STANDARD OF LIVING_ and now
that our standard of living is
eroding we are seeing more people
living like cockroaches. Not only
that, _ALL_ of this has to do with
choices people make. You give marketers
_WAY_ too much credit. I live in a
house built at the turn of the century
and it's not hard to see why people
wanted to move to their own brand
new box in a new suburb. (Example:
one bathroom). That's not an
artifact of marketing, buddy.
\_ Overpopulation and resource depletion
leads to a declining standard
standard of living. Why is that
surprising to you? People have lived
in large crowded cities since at least
the Roman Empire, you are nuts to
think that this is a modern invention.
Sure, subsidence farmers lived spread
Sure, subsistence farmers lived spread
out, but cities were denser before
the automobile. Have you been to any
of Europe? I prefer my solidly built
turn of the century house to the ticky
tacky crap that passes for "luxury"
these days. And btw, people used to
live in much smaller houses, so you
are wrong about the "large houses"
part, too. -!tom
http://www.moyak.com/papers/house-sizes.html
\_ 1. I prefer my old house, too,
but that's because I like
the character. You can realize,
though, why post-WW II families
thought that moving to a new,
modern house with a yard and
2 bathrooms was appealing.
2. By "large houses" I mean a
large footprint (less dense).
Houses have gotten larger over
time, but the lots they are
built on has not.
\_ So "large house with large
yards" really means "small
house with large yard" in
your language? Could you
please clarify which defn
of "large" you are using next
time, so I don't get confused?
Thanks in advance.
3. Large crowded cities were not
a very common way of life.
This is a modern innovation.
From Scientific American,
September 2005:
"From the beginning of the
Christian era to about
1850, the urban population
of the world never exceeded
7 percent. The Industrial
Revolution quickly changed
that--today 75 percent of
people in the U.S. and
other developed countries
live in cities, according
to the United Nations."
You tell me which is more
recent.
\_ Prior to the industrial
revolution, people outside
of cities were organized
in family units; multiple
generations would live
densely within the same
house or on the same land.
The land provided most of
the daily needs of the
group, requiring little
travel relative to current
practice. The concept of
"commuting" is a modern
invention (and a carbon-
expensive one). -tom |
| 2009/11/23-12/6 [Uncategorized] UID:53541 Activity:nil |
11/23 Looking for a NAS and SANS combo. I love NAS for its convenience
and SANS for speed. Ideally I'd like to have both. Ideas?
\_ NetApp will do both. -ausman
\_ EMC had a NFS/SAN hybrid that supposedly mixed attributes of both,
we didn't go with it, and I can't find whitepapers now. -ERic |