The Daily WTF: Curious Perversions in Information Technology

2007-09-02 Reply Admin

Chris:
Global Warmer:
I recently read were Norwegian scientists found that gasses emitted, by a single moose, in a year is equivalent to a person driving 11,000 KM in their car. Years ago I remember something similar being said about cows.

Oh shit, I've just realised you said MOOSE, not MOUSE! There goes my imagination...! Uh!

Thanks for that picture!

I just had to imagine a high-speed-rocket-propelled mouse, so it can emit the requiered amount of gas...

Besides that I thionk its a very nice license agreement. After all, its up to you what you do with it. There are many ways to reduce ones CO2 footprint. Even small steps count and make an impact.

But I wont go vegan to do it...

2007-09-02 Reply Admin

CastrTroy:
DWalker59:
Speaking of which, many researchers claim that a "well-to-wheels" (or "field-to-wheels") analysis shows that hydrogen and ethanol take more energy in their entire production, transportation, and storage lifetimes than they provide in available energy, while hydrocarbons provide more than they take.
Strange.

How much energy does it take to actually produce crude oil? We don't know, because we can't produce it. It's a non-renewable resource. Once we run out, it's gone. Also, using oil just emits CO2 and other pollutants without actually cleaning them up. While using ethanol can actually clear some CO2 from the atmosphere vis-a-vis the plants used to produced ethanol.

Well thats wrong.. You see the produced ethanol is usually burned. THen it produces CO2. Also you need to refine the ethanol, which takes heat, which usually also requiers some amount of energy (read: CO2). The usuable leftovers of the plants then compose, which will also generate CO2 and methane. So Anything you do, to get your car propelled, will produce CO2...

The only way -NOT- to produce CO2 would be to store away the plants, and make sure that they dont compose (This is an ancient secret, which is getting lost... It was called "Book" and places to store them where called a Libary)

Also the amount of stored books is uaually way to small to make a real impact...

2007-09-02 Reply Admin

Nomen Nescio:
codeman38:
No, seriously, not joking! Here's Language Log's post on the matter.
Still not entirely sure how that applies to fast Ethernet sentence, though. Maybe there was 'doing' somewhere else in the sentence and it somehow got transplanted in the midst of translation?

That makes a lot of sense. Otherwise it would seem to speak poorly of (a) the level of Chinese speakers or, (b) their perception of the level of English speakers..

Or else there are a lot of poorly paid translators getting their own back on their employers...

2007-09-02 Reply Admin

seebs:
Maciej:
The fact that our trains are largely relegated to cargo hauling in the US is as much a result of rotting, underfunded infrastructure as anything else. The fact that the most significant point of interest near your city is 300 miles away would make a great reason to build a nice, high capacity point-to-point mass transit link between the two cities. Like a railroad. It's far enough that it's a pain to drive, but not far enough that you'd casually buy a plane ticket.

We'd need a HUGE number of people taking those trains before they'd be worth it -- and it's just not viable.

For medium distances trains can be quite convenient though. Say I want to go from Rotterdam to Paris. Taking the Thalys, a high speed train, that takes about three hours. That's much faster than you can drive. And considering that to take a plane you're likely to have to go to Amsterdam first (in the wrong direction) and you have to check in and go through airport security it's likely faster than flying as well.

Plus far more places have train stations than airports. Odds are that when flying, you end up having to take a train or bus part of the way anyway.

2007-09-02 Reply Admin

My Name:
Well thats wrong.. You see the produced ethanol is usually burned. THen it produces CO2. Also you need to refine the ethanol, which takes heat, which usually also requiers some amount of energy (read: CO2). The usuable leftovers of the plants then compose, which will also generate CO2 and methane. So Anything you do, to get your car propelled, will produce CO2...
The only way -NOT- to produce CO2 would be to store away the plants, and make sure that they dont compose (This is an ancient secret, which is getting lost... It was called "Book" and places to store them where called a Libary)

Also the amount of stored books is uaually way to small to make a real impact...

Are you trolling ? My ironymeter broke just the other day, and I can't for the life of me figure out if you're a dimwit with no idea about what he's talking about, or a wise man trying to get his point across humourously.

Yes, Co2 will be det free in the atmosphere when the plants, alcohol etc. are burned up. Yes, it will be absorbed by new plants, which can then be made into alcohol and burned again. This part is called the Co2-cycle (at least in Danish).

The problem is when we burn fossil fuels. They add extra Co2 to the above cyclus. The only way to absorb more would be to let more plants grow. Many more plants. Or build apparatus to extract the Co2 from the air - which incidentally is the way things are going.

2007-09-02 Reply Admin

gl:
You would have to resurrect Teddy. Your current prez couldn't find his own ass if he used both hands and a GPS locator.

Well, there's a blessing - no Presidential Goatse.

Arancaytar · 2007-09-02 Reply Admin

I've personally written a web application that does what is described in the first screenshot. Sends username in one email, password in another. Specifically described in the requirements. I'm not making this up.

The joke, of course, is that unlike real mail, the additional difficulty of intercepting a second email is next to negligible if the attacker can intercept a single one.

Arancaytar · 2007-09-02 Reply Admin

Bohr:
gl:
You would have to resurrect Teddy. Your current prez couldn't find his own ass if he used both hands and a GPS locator.

Well, there's a blessing - no Presidential Goatse.

And it means those WMDs won't be making an appearance.

2007-09-02 Reply Admin

nwbrown:
Except if you are a not eating the cows, then they are just living happy lives, farting away.

Really? How much of the cattle that's killed for beef is actually hunted and how much of it is actively raised? We all know the ratios are very near to 0% and 100%. Do you really think if people stopped eating meat that two thirds of grain produced in the US and 80% of the soybeans would end up in feedlots?

Of course they wouldn't. Capitalism does not work that way. If a branch of industry would fail to turn a profit, it would be scrapped. A lot of land that was previously wasted on something inefficient and superfluous like beef production could be re-used to grow fuel crops (or nurture the world's growing population, or both).

nwbrown:
And furthermore you are destroying plants which help reduce greenhouse gases.

Did you know it takes 25 calories from grains and soy to produce 1 calorie of beef in a feedlot? Now you do. That's why it takes one tenth the amount of cultivated land to feed a vegetarian vs. an average US meat-eater, and even less to feed a vegan. In other developed countries, the situation is no better. In the UK, 80 percent of the cultivated land are used to produce animal feed (including pastures).

nwbrown:
And all those beans you eat cause you to create more greenhouse gases yourself.

I'm not aware that you have to eat beans all day if you become a vegan, mostly because it doesn't fit my own experiences. Since stopping to eat and drink animal products (at first solely for health reasons), the only thing I lost is about 22lbs of fat and a severe case of depression.

In fact, I think you have been miseducated about a) the amount of protein the human body needs and b) the amount of protein there is in a plant-based diet. Not only do I consider the recommendation of consuming 10% of daily calories as protein to be grossly inflated* (please excuse the pun), but it's also been discovered that the average vegan consumes only slightly less protein than the average meat eater (14% vs. 16% of daily calories).

*) This figure is derived from WHO data but it includes two substantial safety margins, the application of one of which can IMO only be attributed to paranoia about protein deficiency. But this is rather technical so I stop here (this is already off-topic enough :-) ). 5% of the daily calories for everyone past infancy is a more likely figure and also matches the very low protein content of human breast milk more closely.

Furthermore, if you have been a vegan for a while, your gut flora will adapt which has a number of effects like increased zinc resorption from plant foods and less gas when eating fibrous foods. This is to be expected as the intestines of a meat-eater contain a lot of flesh-eating bacteria and they don't thrive in a vegetarian diet, so they will be supplanted by bacteria specialized on digesting plant matter.

2007-09-02 Reply Admin

Blackrose:
Random832:
mrprogguy:
Someone You Know:
chainletter:
大卡车撞死了，司机将我抛进路径边的小河里，然后逃走了，你看到这条消息后，请将它发给四个论坛，如果没有发，你的妈妈会在1个月被撞死，你的爸爸会得绝症，如果你照着上面做了，在5天后你喜欢的人也会喜欢你因为这条话太毒了我不得不
您的父亲是也是!
該答覆是經典!
这个线程是真正的跆拳道)

中国語が分かりません！

The Chinese language does not understand?

2007-09-02 Reply Admin

rast:
EcoFreak:
The WordWeb one is probably not an error. The vendor just wants people to be more eco-friendly and is willing to offer use of their software in exchange.

And that's the real WTF.

I can hardly believe that driving east-to-west coast will pollute less than flying in a modern, fully loaded jetliner. Do notice that the drive will imply a couple overnight stops, grub on the way etc -- all adding to the pollution emitted by the car.

Any input on that?

2007-09-03 Reply Admin

AdT:
5% of the daily calories for everyone past infancy is a more likely figure and also matches the very low protein content of human breast milk more closely.

A few nitpick : the low protein content of the human breast milk has a reason which you are mentioning : it is to slow down the growth process of human baby and let the brain develop. Which is also why the protein content is different in amino acid than other milk. In comparison cow milk is high in protein because baby cow have to grow quick.

"In the UK, 80 percent of the cultivated land are used to produce animal feed (including pastures). " I dunno for the UK, I could not find a governmental statistic, but in France the last statistic from my government is that less than 11% of the total surface cultivated is used for livestock (holding pen, and field used to grow to feed animals).

Furthermore what do you wish to do with that freed place ? More food ? That would not solve a BIT the feeding problem of the 3rd world unless you include "and distribute it for free". And that would need a far more bigger chance in our society than stopping eating meat (on my dead body by the way).

2007-09-03 Reply Admin

chainletter:
大卡车撞死了，司机将我抛进路径边的小河里，然后逃走了，你看到这条消息后，请将它发给四个论坛，如果没有发，你的妈妈会在1个月被撞死，你的爸爸会得绝症，如果你照着上面做了，在5天后你喜欢的人也会喜欢你因为这条话太毒了我不得不

"The big truck 撞死, the driver throws me nearby the way in the creek, then ran away, after you saw this news, please issues it four forums, if has not sent, your mother can 撞死 in 1 month, your daddy can result in incurable illness, if you illuminated above have been doing, you liked the person after 5 days also being sure to like you because this speech too poisonous I have been able not but"

http://babelfish.altavista.com

2007-09-03 Reply Admin

DWalker59:
Does flying 120 to 300 people at a time emit more CO2 than those 120 to 300 people driving to their destination?

Well, the new Airbus A380 has a reported fuel comsumption of 0.76 gallons per passenger per 60 miles, or about 80mpg per passenger. Of course, that assumes the plane is always full. If you were to drive on your own, the plane would be more efficent in theory. Driving a family of four would cut the fuel use from 20mpg per 4 passengers to around 40mpg in a car. A coach load of passengers would be even more efficent.

There's nothing like a bit of statistical massaging to confuse the population.

Skizz

Shakje · 2007-09-03 Reply Admin

Of course, the real WTF is that roughly 20% of Americans have passports and that the journeys they make by air are internal. I've been to The States, driven down the West Coast, inland to Texas and Arizona, popped over the border, back up and across to San Fran, stopping at Vegas, Phoenix and Scottsdale (great place with a great steakhouse, highly recommended). It was a long way but we went by car and managed it in 2 weeks and had a great time.

It's not a case of "if we drive or get a bus or train it's slower" because human industry has survived with long distance transport long before planes were commonplace. Look at all the trade that was conducted on the seas. With the incredible communication technology we have now, it makes more sense than ever to conduct meetings at a long distance and save the emissions, time, and money of travelling long distance just to show your face.

The US consistently seems to fail to address environmental issues, and known authors such as Michael Crichton making a stand against global warming "theory" (can't remember the name of the book, but it's a couple of years old now) probably doesn't help much. If you want to see what's happening in the world have a look at some lakes, or, for example, The Dead Sea, as they were fourty years ago, and what they look like now.

Also, the SUV part of the license appears to be gone from the latest installer.

2007-09-03 Reply Admin

Someone You Know:
chainletter:
大卡车撞死了，司机将我抛进路径边的小河里，然后逃走了，你看到这条消息后，请将它发给四个论坛，如果没有发，你的妈妈会在1个月被撞死，你的爸爸会得绝症，如果你照着上面做了，在5天后你喜欢的人也会喜欢你因为这条话太毒了我不得不

您的父亲是也是!

2007-09-03 Reply Admin

hognoxious:
Kemp:
Make them eco friendly by forcing them to use planes even more? Clue: I live in the UK, I don't make four flights a year.
If that was the intention then a "not more than" would have been a better idea.
You live in the UK but you don't sppeak English well enough to understand what "at most" means?

You use the internet but you don't read posts well enough to realise a simple mistake which was retracted a couple of posts later? And you don't notice the number of other people who also jumped on this mistake and were pointed at the retraction? Trolling is bad mm'kay.

Shakje · 2007-09-03 Reply Admin

Forgot to mention that Greenpeace (I believe it was them) reasonably recently (few months ago) announced that Apple are the most ecologically damaging electronics retailer out there. They have a high-polluting production line, encourage wasting resources with their "bin it, buy the latest" ideal, and are terrible in general for power consumption (let's not forget how many laptop power supplies have blown up as well releasing lots of nasty gas). So I wouldn't be too quick to point out that you have an 'efficient' Mac.

2007-09-03 Reply Admin

Bohr:
gl:
You would have to resurrect Teddy. Your current prez couldn't find his own ass if he used both hands and a GPS locator.

Well, there's a blessing - no Presidential Goatse.

Wow, you just made me sprain my brain. Ugh.

2007-09-03 Reply Admin

seebs:
Maciej:
The fact that our trains are largely relegated to cargo hauling in the US is as much a result of rotting, underfunded infrastructure as anything else. The fact that the most significant point of interest near your city is 300 miles away would make a great reason to build a nice, high capacity point-to-point mass transit link between the two cities. Like a railroad. It's far enough that it's a pain to drive, but not far enough that you'd casually buy a plane ticket.

We'd need a HUGE number of people taking those trains before they'd be worth it -- and it's just not viable.

Keep in mind that the three hundred miles he cites is on the low end for distances people might need to go around here. You can go fifteen hundred miles in a straight line without hitting any national borders, from where I am.

It's the old story; Europeans have to get used to the idea that, in the US, two hundred years is a long time. Americans need to get used to the idea that, in Europe, two hundred miles is a long distance.

I think that, in practice, the economy is moderately efficient. Trains are simply not competitive with cars for most US travel, and for the long hauls, planes win out hugely just on raw speed. Of course, cars have their place too -- we've been known to drive 1400 miles to go to a convention, simply because we needed to be able to carry luggage.

Australia has pretty much the lowest population densities in the world, even when you take out all the uninhabited desert. Although it cost a few hundred million dollars, almost all the tracks on the regional network in my state were replaced and curves straightened out and then new diesel multiple unit trains were introduced, which at 160km/h (which is not fast at all by world standards) made it competitive with car travel. Many services are down to standing room - it wasn't expected that so many people would start taking the train. Adding features like WiFi in trains makes it even more attractive.

Of course, long distance travel (between major cities) isn't competitive by train especially with all the low cost airlines but there have been proposals for high speed rail in the past. It's different to the old days though.

The USA has some of the most ridiculous regulations around. There is a rule that requires all passenger trains to survive a head on collision with a freight train, which is why trains in the US are so heavy and slow, making them a lot more expensive to run too.

2007-09-03 Reply Admin

DWalker59:
Does flying 120 to 300 people at a time emit more CO2 than those 120 to 300 people driving to their destination?
For trans-oceanic flights, does flying across the Atlantic or Pacific ocean emit more CO2 per person than taking a ship? (And not everyone has the time luxury of being able to cruise across an ocean.)

Or are we supposed to stay on the continent that we were born on, and never travel across an ocean?

Speaking of which, many researchers claim that a "well-to-wheels" (or "field-to-wheels") analysis shows that hydrogen and ethanol take more energy in their entire production, transportation, and storage lifetimes than they provide in available energy, while hydrocarbons provide more than they take.

Strange.

A fully occupied plane consumes ± 10% more than a middle-class car (around 10 l/km). A ship often carries cargo and is, therefore, difficult to compare but I believe it has a better yield than a car.

Hydrogen must be produced from water and that needs energy. Alcohol must be distilled in order to separate it from water. The energy that you can get back is never more than the energy needed to separate hydrogen and oxygen one from another. For alcohol the energy needed for distillation will never be recovered. Given that you need additional energy for transport and storage you will always loose some energy. Hydrocarbons are "ready-for-use", i.e. they already are in a high-energy state so you don't need to input this energy anymore: it has been done milions of years ago.

So, the whole thing is not strange at all. But as everybody knows there are 75% of water on earth's surface against 25% of land. Hence, there should be more water on earth (and if there is hydrogen next to oxygen these two will happily combine to give water, whereas hydrogen next to a piece of carbon will not easily form hydrocarbons) then there are hydrocarbons for use as fuel.

QED

2007-09-03 Reply Admin

gl:
operagost:
gl:
Jim L. must be an American. They haven't quite discovered the environment yet.
Don't make me resurrect Teddy Roosevelt so he can kick your ass.

You would have to resurrect Teddy. Your current prez couldn't find his own ass if he used both hands and a GPS locator.

Stop being a trollish jerk, gl. Thanks in advance.

Cthulhu · 2007-09-03 Reply Admin

lacinycmisey:
CO2 is not a greenhouse gas, by anybody's definition

co2 absorbs light within the spectrum of earth's emissions. It is a greenhouse gas by just about anyone's definition.

The biggest producer of CO2 on the planet?? - the oceans.

The oceans absorb more co2 than they emit

There is no conclusive connection between production of CO2 and 'global warming'

The physics behind the greenhouse effect is quite conclusive

between 1940 and 1970, the period of greatest industrial growth the world has known

I doubt that is true, but it's beside the point anyway. co2 emissions were far lower back then than they are today.

average temperatures fell, and scientists started bleating about the impending ice age

A few did, but it was nothing like the situation today with global warming.

Also, average temperatures in Mediaeval times (at least in Northern Europe) were almost certainly higher than they are today

Different warming periods can have different causes

2007-09-03 Reply Admin

Shakje:
I've been to The States, driven down the West Coast, inland to Texas and Arizona, popped over the border, back up and across to San Fran, stopping at Vegas, Phoenix and Scottsdale (great place with a great steakhouse, highly recommended). It was a long way but we went by car and managed it in 2 weeks and had a great time.

Forget everything else I just want to know what kind of car was getting you such great gas mileage that you could drive close to 3000 miles and only stop 3 times.

2007-09-03 Reply Admin

Iago:
FredSaw:
Meanwhile, I guess all of us former flyers will be driving to our destinations now.
The software in question comes from the UK. Over here, we have this amazing thing that we call a "railway" and you Yanks would call a "railroad". It's kind of like planes, only it runs along the ground, so it can use much more efficient technology while simultaneously carrying more people and stopping in more places!

Railway and airplane transportation have very similair CO2 output per capita... I seem to remember about half of the output of a single person driving a car.

2007-09-03 Reply Admin

My husband's exact comment: "Stop, you making head my hurt now, please."

Shakje · 2007-09-04 Reply Admin

will:
Shakje:
I've been to The States, driven down the West Coast, inland to Texas and Arizona, popped over the border, back up and across to San Fran, stopping at Vegas, Phoenix and Scottsdale (great place with a great steakhouse, highly recommended). It was a long way but we went by car and managed it in 2 weeks and had a great time.

Forget everything else I just want to know what kind of car was getting you such great gas mileage that you could drive close to 3000 miles and only stop 3 times.

I don't remember saying we only stopped three times, I just mentioned three places where we had stopped. We stopped about 5 days in San Fran altogether and 1 or 2 days everywhere else.

fbjon · 2007-09-04 Reply Admin

Blackrose:
Random832:
mrprogguy:
Someone You Know:
chainletter:
大卡车撞死了，司机将我抛进路径边的小河里，然后逃走了，你看到这条消息后，请将它发给四个论坛，如果没有发，你的妈妈会在1个月被撞死，你的爸爸会得绝症，如果你照着上面做了，在5天后你喜欢的人也会喜欢你因为这条话太毒了我不得不
您的父亲是也是!
該答覆是經典!
这个线程是真正的跆拳道)

中国語が分かりません！

ならば勉強しなはれ。

Random832 · 2007-09-04 Reply Admin

nwbrown:
First, they can carry more passengers, and there are people in situations where that is a necessity. Either they need a car that can hold 6 or more people

And what's wrong with that? It's called a minivan, or a station wagon.

2007-09-04 Reply Admin

joe17301:
Blackrose:
中国語が分かりません！

The Chinese language does not understand?

No, this means "I don't speak Chinese", pretty much. The full sentence would be "私は中国が分かりません", but the "私は" is implied here. Trying to translate word for word from Japanese doesn't work very well. You just need to know that "Xgawakarimasen" is the idiomatic way of saying "[I] don't speak X", where X is a language.

KenW · 2007-09-04 Reply Admin

Maciej:
If people stop eating cows, there will stop being cows. Nobody will pay to raise giant herds of cattle if it is not profitable. Consider veganism to be a contribution to the reduction of the demand for beef.

Nope. What about milk, leather, and gelatin? They've gotta come from somewhere.

Besides, there's nothing quite like a nice, juicy, medium rare steak. :-)

KenW · 2007-09-04 Reply Admin

Iago:
The software in question comes from the UK. Over here, we have this amazing thing that we call a "railway" and you Yanks would call a "railroad".
(snip)

Actually I believe you used to have something similar yourselves. You know, the great transcontinental railroads, world-famous marvels of American engineering that opened up the continent and basically formed the backbone of the emerging superpower. Whatever happened to those?

Unlike the UK, the US is much larger and things are more spread out. Several days to get across country by train just doesn't work sometimes. Although I've enjoyed some of the train trips I've made, and frequently take the Amtrak from upstate New York to New York City.

Someone You Know · 2007-09-04 Reply Admin

KenW:
Although I've enjoyed some of the train trips I've made, and frequently take the Amtrak from upstate New York to New York City.

And, no doubt, waited motionless for some time at the mercy of CSX freight trains...

KenW · 2007-09-04 Reply Admin

Sven:
Plus far more places have train stations than airports. Odds are that when flying, you end up having to take a train or bus part of the way anyway.

Not here in the US, I'm afraid. Airports are as small as county airports, and exist in very rural areas.

I can go to the local airport (a mile down the road from my office) and catch a flight to either New York City, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Atlanta, or Chicago, and from there anywhere else in the US (and most major destinations worldwide). And all that starting off from a county "international" airport.

KenW · 2007-09-04 Reply Admin

gl:
You would have to resurrect Teddy. Your current prez couldn't find his own ass if he used both hands and a GPS locator.

Unlike you, who managed to find yours using only your head, and even managed to put it inside! Congratulations!!! A talent I'm sure you'll continue to exercise long into the future.

2007-09-04 Reply Admin

bw:
It'll be a cold day before I take enviro-lectures from Europeans. You continously talk about Kyoto and still don't conform. I can count the number of diesel cars I see in a day on one hand, you can't.
Please spare us your self-righteousness.

Diesel-schmiesel? How dim are you? Modern diesel engines are highly efficient and have very low emissions. My diesel sedan does 41.63 mpg (17.7 km/l or 5.65 l/100km), and it's not even among the most efficient of the newer cars on the european market. Cars which, by the way, are fitted with particulate filters to lower emissions even more. 41.63 mpg translates to a helluva lot less C02 (and other stuff) emitted than a big petrol powered pick-up that does < 20 mpg.

2007-09-04 Reply Admin

Funny how most people that commented on my post about moose and cows are advocating that we all become vegetarians, as if that is going to solve the problem of cow and moose farts. So lets say we all do become vegetarians, do we wipe out the cows and moose, make them extinct? I think another group of tree huggers would have a problem with that (hint: PETA). Also noticed the hostilities towards the U.S., European arrogance is incredible, or is it jealousy? By the way, the United States used lots of oil long before George Bush came along. As I recall Al Gore even owned stock in oil (and may still). The person that left the dissertation on German economy and how the government solves all. I am not going to take the time to research all your so called facts but I am certain you are making it out to be far more rosy then it really is. Just for the record though, most Americans do not look to the government to solve all our problems. In fact we have found that the government can screw up a wet dream. Government is far more wasteful then any private industry and government regulation, or over regulation, more often then not leads to some other problem that needs to be fixed. You mentioned the U.S. auto industry, guess what, I live in Detroit and that industry is dying but not because the cars they produce suck down so much more gas then foreign competitors (that was a flat out lie on your part). They are faltering because of the ridiculous concessions they made to the liberal labor unions. I am not blaming the unions they did there job of getting their people as much as possible, it was the car companies fault for allowing it. I have a friend that owns a business in Germany, he imports games and distributes them. From what he tells me the U.S. automakers are in pretty much the same boat as German businesses and for the same reasons. Things going good, the business doesn’t mind making certain concessions without looking to how it will affect the future. Only in Germany’s case they signed the concessions into law so all businesses must suffer, large and small. That brings me to the person that said something to the effect of “even if humans are only causing 20% of greenhouse gases...”. My point exactly, we don’t know what is causing the so-called “global warming” (I don’t think there really is any warming other then natural but for the sake of argument we will say there is.). If your car makes a faint but strange sound on occasion are you going to start replacing parts on it until you find the one that makes that sound go away? No, of course your not, that could get very expensive, time consuming, waste of resources and energy. I know the global warming nuts want to think that all scientists, except those being paid by “big oil” of course, believe man is causing global warming but that simply is not true. In fact I heard a report today that said of the scientists that believe global warming is occurring less then half believe man is causing it (that was on NPR which is VERY liberal). Finally, the person that compared extrapolation of climate and weather patterns to the statistical analysis of tossing a coin, are you serious? Do you honestly believe there are any similarities between the two?

Carnildo · 2007-09-04 Reply Admin

Sven:
seebs:
Maciej:
The fact that our trains are largely relegated to cargo hauling in the US is as much a result of rotting, underfunded infrastructure as anything else. The fact that the most significant point of interest near your city is 300 miles away would make a great reason to build a nice, high capacity point-to-point mass transit link between the two cities. Like a railroad. It's far enough that it's a pain to drive, but not far enough that you'd casually buy a plane ticket.

We'd need a HUGE number of people taking those trains before they'd be worth it -- and it's just not viable.
For medium distances trains can be quite convenient though. Say I want to go from Rotterdam to Paris. Taking the Thalys, a high speed train, that takes about three hours. That's much faster than you can drive. And considering that to take a plane you're likely to have to go to Amsterdam first (in the wrong direction) and you have to check in and go through airport security it's likely faster than flying as well.

Plus far more places have train stations than airports. Odds are that when flying, you end up having to take a train or bus part of the way anyway.

Rotterdam to Paris is about the same distance as Spokane to Seattle. If I needed to travel that, I have three options:

I can take the train. Amtrak runs a train from Spokane to Seattle, and if my schedule happens to coincide with it (departs at 2 AM), I can sit on a train for eight hours.
I can drive. Four and a half hours by road if I obey the speed limit, or three hours if I drive as fast as the road can handle.
I can fly. One hour by airplane plus half an hour in the airport. There's an entire industry based around what are known as "commuter flights" between Seattle and Spokane, for people who live in one city and work in the other.

DWalker59 · 2007-09-04 Reply Admin

misha:

Much as I love sneering at the Septics, I don't think we can hold the high ground on the subject of rail... Pretend to be Dutch and try again.

I sneer at the Septics all the time! Since my house is connected to the city sewer system, I think I am above those low-life Septics!

2007-09-04 Reply Admin

joe17301:
Blackrose:
中国語が分かりません！
The Chinese language does not understand?

No, "The chinese language is not understood". With the implicit understanding that it is not understood by the speaker, as is customary in Japanese.

Cthulhu · 2007-09-05 Reply Admin

Global Warmer:
Finally, the person that compared extrapolation of climate and weather patterns to the statistical analysis of tossing a coin, are you serious? Do you honestly believe there are any similarities between the two?

The point is that weather is not climate. Arguing climate forcasts are invalid because of inaccuracies in weather forcasting over a few days is as wrong as arguing that the outcome of 1000 coin tosses cannot be forcast because you cannot predict a single coin toss with more than 50% accuracy.

Also climate forcasts are not done by extrapolating past climate patterns. The forcasts involve modelling the physics.

2007-09-05 Reply Admin

Cthulhu:
Global Warmer:
Finally, the person that compared extrapolation of climate and weather patterns to the statistical analysis of tossing a coin, are you serious? Do you honestly believe there are any similarities between the two?

The point is that weather is not climate. Arguing climate forcasts are invalid because of inaccuracies in weather forcasting over a few days is as wrong as arguing that the outcome of 1000 coin tosses cannot be forcast because you cannot predict a single coin toss with more than 50% accuracy.

Also climate forcasts are not done by extrapolating past climate patterns. The forcasts involve modelling the physics.

Which is even more complex, virtually everything on the planet (and many things not on the planet) interact in one way or another and thus can and do affect climate on this planet. Look, I am not saying that we shouldn't do what we can to minimize our impact on the environment but the science behind the global warming scare is far from exact and a knee jerk reaction is not a good thing. 30 years ago scientists said we were headed into another ice age and now we are headed into global warming. Snap decisions can't be made because snap decisions tend to make more problems then they solve.

Cthulhu · 2007-09-05 Reply Admin

Sure it's very complex, which is one reason why projections of temperature by 2100 have such a wide range. But from what is known currently, that wide range is centered around warming.

30 years ago the potential influence of human alterations to the atmosphere were becoming widely accepted. But less was understood about the climate back then and it wasn't even known whether human influence in the long term would have an overall cooling effect (global "dimming" due to particle emissions) or a warming effect (due to greenhouse gas emissions). Both hypotheses had a few advocates but the uncertainty meant that there wasn't a solid number of scientists or scientific bodies behind either one. Eventually the warming hypothesis of increasing greenhouse gases won out over the cooling hypothesis of increasing aerosol levels.

Im not saying we should do anything about it, but I think the basis for a large amount of recent warming being manmade is quite solid.

FredSaw · 2007-09-06 Reply Admin

DWalker59:
misha:
Much as I love sneering at the Septics, I don't think we can hold the high ground on the subject of rail... Pretend to be Dutch and try again.
I sneer at the Septics all the time! Since my house is connected to the city sewer system, I think I am above those low-life Septics!

Someone's sprayed WTF with antiseptic.

2007-09-08 Reply Admin

Actually, wakarimasen is "do not understand", hanashimasen is "do not speak". But when referring to a language, not speaking X and not understanding X are pretty much the same thing.

2007-09-10 Reply Admin

I dunno why you laugh from sbd who doesn't know english clear. I should also laugh from You, people from UK and US, who make some products with similar funny informations in Polish (I'm from Poland so I can say sth about that), which is correct in grammar and vocabulary. You think, that everybody should know your language, because it's popular. No.

2007-09-13 Reply Admin

Diesel, emissions wise, is pretty much cleaner than gasoline...

WE are the ones to blame, dear.

2007-12-27 Reply Admin

Woo! I got post 200!

...

I live a sad life.

2008-07-30 Reply Admin

It pissed me off when wordweb blocked their free version.

To unblock the freeversion of wordweb, just remove the registry entry and re-install again.

Or modify the registry value at HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\WordWeb\3 Parameter: Base Binary Value: D5 BF EA 13 73 5D E3 40

Free version shub be able to use as normal after then.

2009-10-29 Reply Admin

AdT:
DWalker59:
Speaking of which, many researchers claim that a "well-to-wheels" (or "field-to-wheels") analysis shows that hydrogen and ethanol take more energy in their entire production, transportation, and storage lifetimes than they provide in available energy.

Oh really? These must be the same researchers that are paid by Big Oil to deny the greenhouse effect in the first place. Probably they include the energy from sunlight in their calculations, then it's actually true (and a truism because of the 1st and 2nd laws of thermodynamics).

But why don't you go and tell Brazil about those findings? They have replaced 50% of their gasoline consumption by ethanol from sugar cane. And all this time they didn't realize they've been wasting energy and are actually paying more!</sarcasm>

DWalker59:
while hydrocarbons provide more than they take.

Methane is a hydrocarbon and can be produced from decomposing plant matter and animal feces quite efficiently.

And how do you think fossile fuels came about in the first place?

Why are people so gullible?

DWalker59:
Strange.

Indeed. /* Snip */

Oddly enough, the difference comes from the raw materials: Brazilians use a plant called Sugarcane to produce ethanol, which is much more efficient at producing sugar than maize, that cannot be efficiently farmed in the so-called Corn Belt in the American heartland.

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