tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post7667801182727812510..comments2024-03-29T05:59:55.834-07:00Comments on CONTRARY BRIN: Astronomy, SETI, science, transparency and wonders!David Brinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comBlogger58125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-53069983383007131812010-10-22T22:48:57.477-07:002010-10-22T22:48:57.477-07:00onward.....onward.....David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-20479177495051583892010-10-22T22:44:42.540-07:002010-10-22T22:44:42.540-07:00@LarryHart:
The notion is alive and well in the Re...@LarryHart:<br /><i>The notion is alive and well in the Republican Party, at least the faction exemplified with Grover Norquist's denigration of liberals as subscribing to a "reality-based worldview", which he meant as an insult, and hiw now-infamous assertion that "We're an empire now. We make our own reality."</i><br /><br />Since that comment was made by an "unnamed" Bush aide, I'm not sure it was Norquist. The most common guess was that it was Rove. But it hardly matters -- the belief is endemic among that branch of the GOP.<br /><br />The basic problem is that there are things that are highly mutable by willpower and belief, things that are slightly mutable, and things that don't respond to belief at all. Properly applied willpower can power social movements... but it can't cancel gravity.<br /><br />Much of humanity's fuzzy thinking results from poor estimates of the degree to which wishing can make it so, as opposed to blood, sweat and tears -- or mis-estimating the right ratio of the two.Catfish N. Codnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-42933788754205702312010-10-22T21:59:27.920-07:002010-10-22T21:59:27.920-07:00Oh, Macs! (Of course; what was I thinking?!)
Use ...Oh, Macs! (Of course; what was I thinking?!)<br /><br />Use spotlight, command-spacebar. Type in "Font Book". Using that app you can select the fonts you don't want and disable them. The selection is in that gear menu-button on the top left.Rob Perkinshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15618647194288598056noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-62502288052965186522010-10-22T20:25:35.115-07:002010-10-22T20:25:35.115-07:00Better yet, a way to change the default font in Te...Better yet, a way to change the default font in Textedit:<br />http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=11164369Tim H.noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-57505112277307344522010-10-22T20:20:50.270-07:002010-10-22T20:20:50.270-07:00You might want to make a "Crap fonts" fo...You might want to make a "Crap fonts" folder and put the unwanted ones there, in case some benighted app needs them..Tim H.noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-82492360714686797892010-10-22T18:16:46.081-07:002010-10-22T18:16:46.081-07:00David, open Control Panel and find the Fonts panel...David, open Control Panel and find the Fonts panel.<br /><br />Delete to your heart's content. <br /><br />But I'm nonplussed; Word has put most-recently-used fonts at the top of its lists for years!Rob Perkinshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15618647194288598056noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-2330969806124453462010-10-22T15:51:56.491-07:002010-10-22T15:51:56.491-07:00I am so sick of having to scroll down through ALL ...I am so sick of having to scroll down through ALL the #$##$@! fonts in MS word and text edit, to get to the one I want to use!<br /><br />If they won't let me eliminate the 99% that I DON'T WANT... is there some way I can rename Times Roman so it comes up top?David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-57809165863130363912010-10-22T13:04:22.660-07:002010-10-22T13:04:22.660-07:00Other prognosticators worth a look:
http://www.sc...Other prognosticators worth a look:<br /><br />http://www.schlockmercenary.com/blog/clarke-orbits-tayler-salmon-and-blue-haired-holograms<br /><br />"I'm no Arthur C. Clarke, but do get email from people who are amazed to see my jokes from a decade ago engineered into realities today.<br /><br />I got a lot of email regarding this recent kerfluffle over whether or not salmon that have been genetically engineered to grow to full size much faster than naturally-occurring salmon are safe for people to eat. Yes, I did that joke in July of 2000. Yes, I fully expected to see GM salmon on my table. What was I thinking?...."<br /><br />and<br />Huxley or Orwell?<br /><br />http://www.acceleratingfuture.com/michael/blog/2010/07/amusing-ourselves-to-death/Hank Robertshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07521410755553979665noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-85450130289946189172010-10-22T09:59:01.973-07:002010-10-22T09:59:01.973-07:00This looks interesting but is it for real?
The Di...This looks interesting but is it for real?<br /><br /><a href="http://nhindirect.org/" rel="nofollow">The Direct Project</a><br />"The Direct Project develops specifications for a secure, scalable, standards-based way to establish universal health addressing and transport for participants (including providers, laboratories, hospitals, pharmacies and patients) to send encrypted health information directly to known, trusted recipients over the Internet. The Nationwide Health Information Network is a set of standards, services and policies that enable secure health information exchange over the Internet. The project itself will not run health information exchange services. ... At the conclusion of this project, there will be one nationwide exchange, consisting of the organizations that have come together in a common policy framework to implement the standards and services. This project is open government, and as such, contains avenues for a broad range of public participation"rewinnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14008105385364113371noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-66728309702723599712010-10-22T04:12:00.452-07:002010-10-22T04:12:00.452-07:00I thought the work/no work applied to deployment.
...I thought the work/no work applied to deployment.<br />Oh well, it was a thought.Tony Fiskhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14578160528746657971noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-1430826892226647012010-10-22T00:27:11.087-07:002010-10-22T00:27:11.087-07:00Tony, the James Webb Space Telescope is not mainta...Tony, the James Webb Space Telescope is not maintainable. It either works or doesn't - even if we could get a manned mission there (which would be more than going to the Moon) they couldn't do anything.<br /><br />That said, it would be one of the coolest and most bizarre things to watch as it orbits an empty point in space (the Earth-Sun L2). None of the Lagrange points are stable like you could plop something there and it would stay there, though it does reduce the amount of fuel you need. Some orbits around the Lagrange points are stable though.SteveOnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-49671265713855264312010-10-21T20:30:27.429-07:002010-10-21T20:30:27.429-07:00Water and other useful stuff has been confirmed at...Water and other useful stuff has been confirmed at the Moon's poles.<br /><br />Meanwhile, the US space plan is focussing on manned missions to NEOs (prelude to Mars etc.) and the Planetary Society is putting together a competition to design a NEO manned mission (or aspect thereof).<br /><br />Reading about the James Webb telescope that's due to launch next year, it occurs to me that manned maintenance missions to an expensive asset stationed near the L2 point would make an excellent preliminary objective.Tony Fiskhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14578160528746657971noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-81591043283187620572010-10-21T19:50:28.418-07:002010-10-21T19:50:28.418-07:00Dadiv, the Statosolar link doesn't work becaus...Dadiv, the Statosolar link doesn't work because you've got two URLs in the same hyperlink.<br /><br />Having now seen the slideshow I'm wondering if you could combine that with either the solar tower idea or any of the various proposals for high-altitude wind.Ianhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01739671401151990700noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-78164139389850459162010-10-21T16:23:48.547-07:002010-10-21T16:23:48.547-07:00This looks like it may be an interesting read:
Br...This looks like it may be an interesting read:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.popmatters.com/pm/review/132084-brilliant-the-evolution-of-artificial-light-by-jane-brox/" rel="nofollow">Brilliant</a><br /><br /><i>A Faustian bargain seems to have been struck. The twin needs of profit by commercial interests and convenience by consumers drove the expansion of light from the earliest days of the candle to today’s ubiquitous power lines. Curiously, destruction of the natural world seems to walk hand in hand with the evolution of artificial light, and its Siamese twin, electricity. From hunting sperm whales almost to extinction in the 1800s, to polluting the air and killing miners for coal to power yesterday’s gas lamps and today’s 'modern' power grid, the history of artificial light and electricity contain a hidden undercurrent of turning inwards, of staying inside, of looking towards a lit screen, of fear and alienation. <br /><br />In her final chapter Brox relates that due to electric light pollution, “two-thirds of all Americans and half of all Europeans can no longer see the Milky Way, our own galaxy, in the nighttime sky.” According to her the sight of it has become so unfamiliar to people that during the 1994 earthquake in Los Angeles, “emergency organizations [...] received hundreds of phone calls from people wondering whether the sudden brightening of the stars and the appearance of a ‘silver cloud’ (the Milky Way) had caused the quake.” </i>sociotardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11697154298087412934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-28386218709811579682010-10-21T10:31:34.734-07:002010-10-21T10:31:34.734-07:00Interesting op-ed piece in the NYT about how GOP a...<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/21/opinion/21collins.html?hpw" rel="nofollow">Interesting op-ed piece in the NYT</a> about how GOP and Tea Party anger is rapidly doing more and more damage to their electoral chances.<br /><br />In short: Ultra-angry candidates who are popular with ultra-angry GOP/Tea Party primary voters, aren't very popular with voters overall, and are prone to political gaffs that make them even less popular among moderate and swing voters.Ilithi Dragonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10300247936272572280noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-53089590896001903532010-10-21T06:34:33.574-07:002010-10-21T06:34:33.574-07:00One for the futurists:
[QUOTE]Africa’s population...One for the futurists:<br /><br />[QUOTE]Africa’s population reached 1 billion last year and after economic growth averaging 4.9 percent from 2000 to 2008 the number of families with an income of more than $20,000 a year has exceeded India’s, according to a report by McKinsey & Co. Inc. With China investing in the continent to exploit its mineral wealth and the population rising by more than 2 percent a year, that market is set to expand.<br /><br />“It will be to their own detriment if companies ignore Africa,” said Celeste Fauconnier, Africa analyst at Johannesburg-based Rand Merchant Bank, the investment banking arm of FirstRand Ltd. “We are seeing massive growth in the population, an increasing middle class and people having more access to money.”<br /><br />Consumer spending in Africa rose at a compound rate of 16 percent between 2005 and 2008, driven by economic and population growth and migration to cities, New York-based McKinsey said in its June report. McKinsey estimated that the number of consumers earning more than $1,000 a year will rise by 221 million within five years.<br /><br />Sub-Saharan Africa’s economy will expand 5.5 percent next year, 2 1/2 times faster than developed countries, according to the International Monetary Fund. Per-capita income in Sub- Saharan Africa was $1,096 last year, according to the World Bank. [/QUOTE]<br /><br />[QUOTE]<br />Poverty remains rampant in Africa, with 50 percent of the population living on less than $1.25 a day, according to the World Bank. And each of the continent’s 53 countries has its own tariffs, laws and regulations.<br /><br />“One must not forget that Africa is lots of different countries, with different cultures, different languages and different ways of doing business,” said Jeanine van Zyl, retail analyst for Old Mutual Investment Group of South Africa, South Africa’s largest privately owned fund manager. “Perhaps they will fail if they try and do it too fast. You have to step away from markets that are not ready to be entered. The process can’t be rushed.”<br /><br />Wal-Mart was lured by the potential of markets such as Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation with 140 million people.<br /><br />“The focus has shifted towards these oil-based economies and commodities-based countries, which is where people have more purchasing power,” said Andrew Kingston, who helps oversee 300 billion rand for Sanlam Investment Management in Cape Town.<br /><br />The purchasing power of Nigerians earning between $1,000 and $5,000 a year doubled to $20 billion between 2000 and 2007, McKinsey estimated. Massmart has plans to increase the number of its outlets in Africa’s largest oil producer to 20 from one over the next two years.<br /><br />Wal-Mart International Chief Executive Officer Doug McMillon told investors at a presentation in Rogers, Arkansas, Oct. 13 that rising income levels in South Africa made Massmart a “tremendous opportunity.” South African consumers are “going to want more general merchandise, they’re going to want more food,” he said. [/QUOTE]<br /><br />http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-20/africa-s-1-billion-consumers-getting-richer-can-t-be-ignored-by-wal-mart.htmlIanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01739671401151990700noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-32874140967002412822010-10-21T05:13:50.929-07:002010-10-21T05:13:50.929-07:00Great quote Larry, you know some people will go al...Great quote Larry, you know some people will go all chamber of commerce on you, but great. BTW, the new color scheme looks elegant.Tim H.noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-25952313148438221382010-10-21T05:04:19.634-07:002010-10-21T05:04:19.634-07:00A bit off-topic, but not entirely so. This was ca...A bit off-topic, but not entirely so. This was called to my attention on Thom Hartmann's radio show yesterday.<br /><br />As most often used by libertarians and free-marketers, Adam Smith's famous quote from "The Wealth of Nations" about the invisible hand is taken almost 180 degrees out of context by leaving off a key phrase. Note the bold (emphasis mine) part below:<br /><br /><i><br />Every individual...generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. <b>By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry</b> he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention.<br /></i>LarryHartnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-16551894669630087712010-10-20T22:42:29.364-07:002010-10-20T22:42:29.364-07:00Very spiffy designerly changes on the front page!
...Very spiffy designerly changes on the front page!<br /><br />hoolic: when hooligans are habitually drunkTheMadLibrariannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-37440576366427878742010-10-20T18:03:35.839-07:002010-10-20T18:03:35.839-07:00If I have a quibble, it's that the heading is ...If I have a quibble, it's that the heading is a bit indistinct from the body of the text.<br /><br />The Whitehouse Science Fair sounds like it was <a href="http://www.planetary.org/blog/article/00002723/" rel="nofollow">a cool event</a> (via Bill Nye).<br /><br />Meanwhile:<br />Then:<br /><i>"We're an empire now. We make our own reality."</i><br /><br />and now:<br /><a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/10/21/3044217.htm" rel="nofollow">reality strikes back</a>:<br /><i>"The FBI has begun investigating whether the US banking industry may have broken laws related to the mortgage foreclosure crisis."</i>Tony Fiskhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14578160528746657971noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-90819600352711095712010-10-20T15:25:14.589-07:002010-10-20T15:25:14.589-07:00Everything's fading to grey....!
Nice!Everything's fading to grey....!<br /><br />Nice!Tony Fiskhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14578160528746657971noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-27277683154007289442010-10-20T15:10:36.093-07:002010-10-20T15:10:36.093-07:00Wowsers! Liking the theme change on the blog's...Wowsers! Liking the theme change on the blog's main page.<br />} : = 8 )Ilithi Dragonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10300247936272572280noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-30930445386627407782010-10-20T14:26:05.565-07:002010-10-20T14:26:05.565-07:00"raise them with a crushed sense of curiosity..."raise them with a crushed sense of curiosity and individual imagination? And you still have very little "science"."<br /><br />Thinking further about this, I think a key part of the problem is that the nepotism and ideological thinking inherent in totalitarian societies prevents the proper functioning of the scientific process.<br /><br />Lysenko wouldn't have gotten very far if he weren't able to censor (and in extreme cases use the whole weight of the Soviet police state against) the scientists who exposed his fraud.Ianhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01739671401151990700noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-17364155518120457902010-10-20T11:56:20.627-07:002010-10-20T11:56:20.627-07:00Thanks Tim. Yeah, the Nazis were not great innova...Thanks Tim. Yeah, the Nazis were not great innovators, and their slave <br />labor approach made for huge inefficiencies.<br /><br /> Abilard, nobody claims that lefty campus profs aren't horrors. Me? I hate em! They despise science fiction and their often anti-engineering stance combines with self-hating contempt for a western enlightenment that gave them everything. Withness AVATAR. But those dopes are a hangnail irritation on my left side... a pale shadow of the threat the left used to be. <br /><br />Meanwhile, the oligarchy on the right has grown into the worst threat to freedom and western civilization we have seen since the Cold War. Ian, Soviet physics was pretty good, because it nestled into traditions of analytical calculus and had few political implications... and was totally relevant to weaponry. <br /><br />But Soviet Biology, cybernetics, genetics, environmental science, all languished and were prostituted into incompetence. <br /><br />China's problem is different. Graduate 80% of the world's engineers and you'll dominate making things. Graduate 80% of the world's "scientists" but raise them with a crushed sense of curiosity and individual imagination? And you still have very little "science".David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-81698506759789424602010-10-20T11:54:58.928-07:002010-10-20T11:54:58.928-07:00This comment has been removed by the author.David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.com