tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post6290371214770727886..comments2024-03-29T06:22:47.638-07:00Comments on CONTRARY BRIN: Shifting centers of balance: trends undermining OPEC, Russia, and (possibly) China!David Brinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comBlogger77125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-50955103193818017262018-10-30T01:47:21.896-07:002018-10-30T01:47:21.896-07:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.siskahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07076079736141144027noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-55322016936479707252015-10-05T11:26:58.293-07:002015-10-05T11:26:58.293-07:00"[...]But now you no longer pay $10,000 a yea...<i>"[...]But now you no longer pay $10,000 a year to the utility, so as long as you are on the solar system, you are no longer contributing to GDP. Further, if you buy an electric car and charge it, you are no longer buying gas, and thus the portion of your money previously spent on fuel is no longer contributing to GDP."</i><br /><br />This is pretty specious -- that $10,000 might no longer be contributing to the bottom line of gas companies, but it's now available to contribute to other industries and, thus, to GDP.Celsius1414http://www.celsius1414.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-52044720559575193582015-09-12T16:32:35.075-07:002015-09-12T16:32:35.075-07:00onward
onward
onward<br /><br /><br />onward<br />David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-89924252082807998122015-09-12T16:32:25.602-07:002015-09-12T16:32:25.602-07:00Anon how does it feel as increasingly you grow awa...Anon how does it feel as increasingly you grow aware that the scientific people around you know... they know for a fact ... that you are crazy? You clutch ever more bizarre rationalizations, while the Arctic ocean goes ice-free and the US military is frantically preparing for climate change problems and every scientist who can parse the Navier Stokes equation (can you? can ANYONE you know?) is desperately worried?<br /><br />Does it wake you up, even occasionally, that the shill propaganda mills that feed you your hypnotic hate-science talking points are the same ones who declared negroes inferior, then cars don't cause smog, then tobacco is cancer free?<br /><br />Do you have a backup plan, for when (not if) you are exposed as having been their tool? Just wondering. <br />David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-77364619372465307082015-09-12T15:04:42.370-07:002015-09-12T15:04:42.370-07:00I smell the powerful and obnoxious odor of mendaci...I smell the powerful and obnoxious odor of mendacity!<br />- Big DaddyJumperhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11794110173836133321noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-32100808185367993312015-09-12T14:54:05.003-07:002015-09-12T14:54:05.003-07:00@Anon - that report is almost overwhelmingly in su...@Anon - that report is almost overwhelmingly in support of GW, that it is anthropogenic and GHG is the driver. There is no question and results that support your implied dissent.<br /><br />Q 4c is directed at the subset (271) of the respondents who answered that they thought the IPCC climate sensitivity was too high.Alex Tolleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01556422553154817988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-82801708108573718362015-09-12T12:57:06.031-07:002015-09-12T12:57:06.031-07:00
Only 43% of climate scientists agree with the IPC...<br />Only 43% of climate scientists agree with the IPCC “97%” certainty.”<br /><br />http://www.pbl.nl/sites/default/files/cms/publicaties/pbl-2015-climate-science-survey-questions-and-responses_01731.pdfAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-59946597975185414232015-09-12T11:34:58.626-07:002015-09-12T11:34:58.626-07:00I apologize for the remark that coule be interpret... I apologize for the remark that coule be interpreted as meaning that Tacitus bobble-heads anything. SIncerely.<br /><br />Too bad it blocked the point, which was in refutation of his assertion that the parties are roughly the same when it comes to the so-called "liberal bias" of 'facts'. <br /><br />Please replace "The fact that you would nod when Ted Cruz says....." with "The fact that any sapient citizen would nod when Ted Cruz says....."<br /><br />The stunning deceitfulness of pegging "before" appraisals of global warming upon 1998's hottest year in all human recordings is so toweringly and spectacularly fact-averse that any member of such a movement would angrily demand correction if ONLY in order to salvage some credibility for the movement. Like failing to ask WHICH eight foreign governments George Soros personally "toppled."<br /><br />But these aren't isolated examples. If Politifact seems to have a tilt... it is less ideologiocal that preponderance of actual facts.David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-67452914478174132662015-09-12T10:48:30.495-07:002015-09-12T10:48:30.495-07:00Chomsky on the Iran deal.
https://www.youtube.c...Chomsky on the Iran deal. <br /><br />https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpqWzeiezsYAlex Tolleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01556422553154817988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-35239084086477460812015-09-12T08:27:18.513-07:002015-09-12T08:27:18.513-07:00For what it's worth, Tacitus, I saw no call fo...For what it's worth, Tacitus, I saw no call for that either considering how you usually present yourself. Jumperhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11794110173836133321noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-33654466698903117572015-09-12T07:38:45.567-07:002015-09-12T07:38:45.567-07:00"The fact that you would nod when Ted Cruz sa..."The fact that you would nod when Ted Cruz says....."<br /><br />Whatever follows after that is unimportant. When someone bothers to come here and offer the occasional insight he or she deserves better than to be considered a mindless bobblehead. You transgress, Sir, when you presume to know how I would respond to anything Sen. Cruz has to say.<br /><br />I have serious questions as to the value of a Comments Section to Contrary Brin. It does not bring out the best in your prose. The insights offered by others still rise to mildly interesting once in a while (did like the discussion on illegal cheese a few weeks back).<br /><br />But really, I and most reasonable people have more important uses of my time. And if I get nostalgic I can just check back in a month or three. The Comments will read the same.<br /><br />Tacitus Tacitushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17007086196578740689noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-14179611219171939682015-09-12T06:39:16.433-07:002015-09-12T06:39:16.433-07:00I was left with fewer career choices as transforme...I was left with fewer career choices as transformer manufacturing went to Mexico. It hurt mostly because I had much to offer in what I'd learned, but management focused solely on labor cost rather than face certain technological errors they themselves had made. So it's hard to say what I lost because the opportunities vanished.Jumperhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11794110173836133321noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-90336297390148425612015-09-12T02:54:21.799-07:002015-09-12T02:54:21.799-07:00And so many seem to be shocked at the rise of old ...And so many seem to be shocked at the rise of old school demagogic populism in our political arena.<br /><br />Its a natural reaction to whats been going on among our political classes and their melding with the capitalist class, especially the finance wing of said capitalist class.<br /><br />You couldn't possibly think that there wouldn't be a reaction to the erosion of middle and working class social status because of it could you?<br /><br />Its also not surprising that the reaction is coming from the right. Since the Democratic Party has become so ridiculously craven and cowardly with actually acknowledging the plight of the lower classes out of fear of being labeled socialist that they have left the forfeited the entire issue to the populist right. Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17682002943134937523noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-9237424982397500512015-09-12T02:45:37.933-07:002015-09-12T02:45:37.933-07:00"I'm curious...
Who here has been harmed ..."I'm curious...<br />Who here has been harmed by NAFTA in a tangible way?"<br /><br />After the American textile industry was disintegrated after the inaction of the treaty in 1994, the Lee Jeans Company shut down all of their plants in the Ozarks region of southern Missouri.<br /><br />My father had been a fork lift driver for a plant in a town called Lebanon MO for twenty years before the closing. We ended up losing our house( I was 15 at the time) and living with my grandparents for a year before my father found another job.<br /><br />I know that those in the actual working classes have no value in your absolutist ideological "Classical Liberal" mindset, but "free trade" has real consequences for actual human beings at the bottom of the pay scale. <br /><br />But of course as I said, you don't see value in basic human labor, so I doubt you really care.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17682002943134937523noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-85159066554798913062015-09-12T00:57:18.459-07:002015-09-12T00:57:18.459-07:00For an example of a smart grid done right, look at...For an example of a smart grid done right, look at Chattanooga, TN. Due to frequent blackouts and the electric companies losing money as a result, they elected to upgrade their infrastructure to include fiberoptic smart grid control, in the hopes it would reduce blackouts and allow areas affected to recover faster. It did, and as a beneficial side effect, Chattanooga also created the fastest municipal Internet service in the Western Hemisphere. This put Comcast's knickers in a twist; Comcast sued the city twice, unsuccessfully. Now Chattanooga's inhabitants receive a gigabit per second Internet access, and more reliable power distribution.<br />http://www.thegigtank.com/gig-cityTheMadLibrariannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-14916845999545932172015-09-11T21:57:55.918-07:002015-09-11T21:57:55.918-07:00The irony is that I used Uber in SF a few weeks ag...The irony is that I used Uber in SF a few weeks ago, and with congestion pricing, the trip was more expensive than the same trip I had taken in a regulated taxi cab. I was not impressed. Uber is certainly more ubiquitous there, but the drivers are fairly clueless, and are working for pocket money in comparison to cab drivers. Let's see Uber compete when they have to pay their drivers as employees.Alex Tolleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01556422553154817988noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-74137931535907961172015-09-11T20:21:44.071-07:002015-09-11T20:21:44.071-07:00Not quite the trends mentioned in the post, but it...Not quite the trends mentioned in the post, but it does involve undermining...<br /><br /><a href="http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20150908/ARTICLE/150909666/2416/NEWS?p=2&tc=pg" rel="nofollow">Sarasota opts to deregulate</a>Alfred Differhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01170159981105973192noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-40434837839347837282015-09-11T20:18:53.310-07:002015-09-11T20:18:53.310-07:00Okay. I'll just admit that I don't get the...Okay. I'll just admit that I don't get the argument that we have to have meaningful jobs to have dignity. I see it the other way around. If I have dignity, I will make my job meaningful whether I work for someone or myself. Purpose is necessary, but it comes from within.<br /><br />Most of us are already free of the 'jobs' our ancestors held 8,000 years ago. We've found other ways to ensure we acquire the means to live and increased the population by a couple orders of magnitude. So... I'm not overly worried. If 'they' want to keep 'their' food, water, energy, and so on, they will find people at their gates like one of my grandmothers who will just take it from them... or worse.Alfred Differhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01170159981105973192noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-73950639838227672402015-09-11T19:02:03.675-07:002015-09-11T19:02:03.675-07:00Alfred Differ:
No human competes with a tool if t...Alfred Differ:<br /><i><br />No human competes with a tool if they have half a brain. They use the tool to extend themselves. Do I compete with a hammer when doing carpentry work by smashing nails in with my hands? No. I grab a tool and use it.<br /></i><br /><br />No, of course a human doesn't compete with his own tool. He competes with the machines that are owned by the private owners of his means of survival. I think I agree with you that technology <b>should</b> free humans from drudgery and give them leisure to pursue higher goals. I despair that in reality, technology only seems to "free" humans from the ability to earn a living, because the owners don't need us any more, and so have no reason to give us any of "their" food, water, energy, or living space.<br /><br />John Henry competed with a steam drill. IIRC correctly, he actually won, but at the cost of his life.<br /><br />That's my take. Vonnegut's was slightly different, and I only "get it" late in life. His story seemed to assert that humans without meaningful jobs lacked dignity. His point wasn't about wages per se.LarryHartnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-14277456779363404232015-09-11T18:46:44.718-07:002015-09-11T18:46:44.718-07:00Iran doesn’t actually need nukes and it is quite p...Iran doesn’t actually need nukes and it is quite possible they know that. Ranting as if they plan to develop one is useful, though. It is the ploy a weak player uses to scare the stronger one into leaving them be for a while. Don’t mess with the insane kid! He just might do the illogical thing! North Korea plays this game even better.<br /><br />A deal with Iran (just about any deal) encourages them to stop playing that game and try a different one. Obviously we want a good outcome, but ending the scare game is useful to us.Alfred Differhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01170159981105973192noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-78017845218812277502015-09-11T18:42:19.209-07:002015-09-11T18:42:19.209-07:00@raito: Getting the electricity distributors to sh...@raito: Getting the electricity distributors to shift often involves interactions with local PUC’s and a lot of thought given to writing off old generation assets with payback durations measured in decades. Renewables are disruptive in a market that makes multi-decade plans. It’s a non-trivial problem to figure out who gets stuck with the bad investments.Alfred Differhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01170159981105973192noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-77544466196986956922015-09-11T18:32:24.061-07:002015-09-11T18:32:24.061-07:00@locumranch: I had to smile at the notion of a Sun...@locumranch: I had to smile at the notion of a Sunni domino theory. How familiar that sounds to those of us who were alive during the 60’s. 8)<br /><br />If the Sunni states were so easily toppled, they’d have gone extinct many generations ago. That region of the world is familiar with genocide. Nukes are just something else to which they will adapt. <br /><br />The only domino theory that makes any sense to me is the one that say ‘if one gets it, they all will.’ When I’m in a dark mood, I think to myself that this might do them some good. It would put all of them on our target lists. ALL of them.Alfred Differhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01170159981105973192noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-8902195591630543062015-09-11T18:26:12.109-07:002015-09-11T18:26:12.109-07:00@LarryHart: Regarding Vonnegut’s story where a hum...@LarryHart: Regarding Vonnegut’s story where a human competing with a slave must become a slave, I’m going to call ‘nonsense’. A human doing that is just being stupid. A slave is a tool wither it is mechanical or biological. (The moral evil comes from turning a human into a tool.) No human competes with a tool if they have half a brain. They use the tool to extend themselves. Do I compete with a hammer when doing carpentry work by smashing nails in with my hands? No. I grab a tool and use it.<br /><br />The machines won’t be slaves. They will either be our children or literal extensions of our selves. The first is not a slave. The second is a tool even if it is a tool capable of love.Alfred Differhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01170159981105973192noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-83878494357531707822015-09-11T18:04:04.611-07:002015-09-11T18:04:04.611-07:00Alex is even more right when it comes to the sever...Alex is even more right when it comes to the several million Iranian expatriates who will now have far better access to their homeland, where their money and ideas can tip the balance.<br /><br />Idiots raving against the Iran deal never mention one feature... Iran HANDS OVER nearly all of the Uranium that they have already enriched to intermediate levels. Several years worth at MAX production. And they are handing it over. That in itself should have mollified the hawks, and it would have! If Obama had been Republican.<br /><br />TACITUS: sorry, but facts do have an extreme liberal bias. Not because leftism is correct. American style liberals are not leftist by any reasonable standards and American leftists control nothing but some city councils and universities.<br /><br />No the bias is real because it happens that 90% of todays American conservatives are clinically crazy, engaged in one level or another of denial. It has surprisingly little to do with classic left-right, since in fact EVERY metric of overall economic and market health does better across democratic administrations, every single one. Period. Indeed, FIND for me one case where my indictments against the right have anything to do with "socialist" positions. You know darned well that I am Adam Smith's truest heir.<br /><br />No, my evidence is simple. All of the professions where facts matter are fleeing the GOP as fast as they can. Scientists above all. But also vast majorities of teachers, civil servants, economists, medical doctors, skilled labor and military officers. <br /><br />The fact that you would nod when Ted Cruz says "this and such specific data shows no global heating across the last seventeen years...!" and no specificity alarm goes off? No checking why SEVENTEEN years? Chosen in order to peg the "before" comparison on the hottest year (1998) that humanity ever saw? The last huge El Nino? That sly trick was used in almost every conservative medium and by every mouthpiece...<br /><br />...and any American conservative who does no writhe in embarrassment over such diabolically evil tricks has no basis for claiming that "facts are evenhanded."David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-12539739476760061032015-09-11T16:43:20.237-07:002015-09-11T16:43:20.237-07:00I think I stated my position quite succinctly, Rob...<br /><br />I think I stated my position quite succinctly, Rob. I would not have agreed to this Iranian deal because it is empty talk, a non-deal, an irrelevancy and a distraction, lacking in checks, balances & penalties, about as binding as an abstinence pledge from a horny teenager or the sovereign debt of Argentina, Greece & Puerto Rico.<br /><br />In the absence of consequence, reciprocity or mutually-assured destruction, most treaties aren't worth the pinky-promise paper they're written on, so why bother bloviating ? Frack em all, especially those who confuse educated intelligence with reciprocating morality, never forgetting that Pax 'anything' presupposes the potential of a 'second strike' cataclysm (provided to the Middle East locale by Israel, perhaps?)<br /><br />And we will all bake together when we bake. There'll be nobody present at the wake. With complete participation in that grand incineration, nearly (seven) billion hunks of well-done steak --- the alternative being that we balkanise soonest, think & act locally (for a change) instead of globally, and offer a choice of vegetarian, kosher & halal entrees.<br /><br /><br />Bestlocumranchnoreply@blogger.com