zeteo

71 ms·

631.
by zeteo 15y ago
Ah, but I didn't say anything about the reason why water is so cheap. (Smith would explain it takes little effort to procure it - not that different from the marginalist argument.) What matters for the issue at hand is that its utility ca
632.
by zeteo 15y ago
>you're not stealing a thing when you copy it, but you are stealing the utility that it confers [...] that you would otherwise have had to pay for. You're taking value and not compensating for it, aka theft. I think our metaphors of pro
633.
by zeteo 15y ago
>That does not provide the same utility for riaa as the avatar.mp4 did for Joe blow. Good old Adam Smith teaches us that value in exchange is often the opposite of value in use. (His example is that we pay very little for water, which i
634.
by zeteo 15y ago
If you have any interest at all in the subject, Zarkonnen is making a very good recommendation. Red Plenty has brought Soviet society to life for me in a way that no other book or article could (and I've read a few).
635.
by zeteo 15y ago
>If you can proof to yourself after the election that your correct vote went into the system, you can proof this to other people too. The receipt doesn't prove who you voted for, just that the associated vote was counted. >every per
636.
by zeteo 15y ago
>We don't need computers in voting. We don't "need" computers for preparing office documents either, but they sure come in handy. The system you are describing is not perfect and it's misguided to reject suggested improvements out of ha
637.
by zeteo 15y ago
I've done some business in EVE Online for a while, and it's as much fun as you describe, but a somewhat more mature market. Any competent EVE trader would have squeezed into your market quite easily, and even have a choice of two methods. T
638.
by zeteo 15y ago
>I am very tempted to flag this. the sociopath thing really rubs me the wrong way Geeze Louise. I don't think flagging, on this site, is meant as a downvote for articles where you disagree with some terms' definitions. >The United S
639.
by zeteo 15y ago
Upon closer inspection, they only use 1750 construction workers for 4 years per reactor. By your figures, that's 0.7 billion total. Let's assume the Chinese pay absolutely nothing for nuclear-reactor-qualified workers. Where do the other 4.
640.
by zeteo 15y ago
The estimate for the two reactors involves 3500 on-site construction workers [1] with a completion date of 2016 or 2017 [2]. This means 1750 construction workers employed for 4-5 years at each reactor. The average annual wage for a constru
641.
by zeteo 15y ago
Haven't heard anyone arguing for the elimination of the chemical industry after the Bhopal accident.
642.
by zeteo 15y ago
I don't think labor costs account for much of the difference. You can pay the salaries of 10,000 US construction workers for 7 years with a single billion. (I seriously doubt they need to hire that many people for one reactor.) And, due to
643.
by zeteo 15y ago
"What makes a difference in Georgia is that the state has ruled that customers are going to have to pay, he said." Not taxpayers. Subsidies have actually been going to wind and solar for quite a few decades (see Solyndra) - not to nuclear
644.
by zeteo 15y ago
"two new atomic energy reactors at an estimated cost of $14 billion [...] known as AP1000s, built by Westinghouse Electric Co." From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AP1000 : "China has officially adopted the AP1000 as a standard for inland nu
645.
by zeteo 15y ago
> What do you call a man with no material possessions? Recently divorced.
646.
by zeteo 15y ago
> What is the end result of growth that makes societies "better"? How about the fact that, when we do well, we are a bit more likely to spend that 1% of our resources on new technology, and get stuff that we later take for granted, like
647.
by zeteo 15y ago
It looks like they're going for telepresence. Their purpose of monitoring detainee health probably involves a doctor logging into the robot and making the rounds.
648.
by zeteo 15y ago
But a common design goal is to maximize altitude, and an automated valve would help with that. You can also have it wired to open if the balloon stops ascending, or strays too far.
649.
by zeteo 15y ago
Or an automated valve controlled by a manometer. The people who build these awesome contraptions seem to put a lot of effort into the payload and comparatively a lot less into the balloon.
650.
by zeteo 15y ago
I see you've gone to great lengths to make it lighter this time. Any idea what the relationship is between payload weight and balloon burst altitude?
651.
by zeteo 15y ago
There's a good deal of energy and emissions involved in building a $400 fixture from scratch, and also an ongoing cost in pumping the water. Proper carbon accounting might actually reveal bidet use is worse than toilet paper (also, tree far
652.
by zeteo 15y ago
Wait ten more years, you'll also be able to use obscure references.
653.
by zeteo 15y ago
Yes, of course you wouldn't directly use an H bomb, the idea was that the quantities of fissile materials needed to propel a 100kg interstellar probe to 0.2c are easily within reach of several nations. Controlled fusion can be achieved in v
654.
by zeteo 15y ago
The key to a successful interstellar probe is probably miniaturization. You only need about 5kg of Pu-239 (energy density ~8.8e13 J/kg) to accelerate a 1kg payload to 10% of the speed of light (energy requirement ~4.5e14 J). A single large
655.
by zeteo 15y ago
Blacking the background is enough to make it a top TV news story, and that's a medium politicians understand very well. Whereas removal of functionality will irk uncaring users and may turn them against the SOPA opposition.
656.
by zeteo 15y ago
Great domain, good logo, but what does the startup do?
657.
by zeteo 15y ago
Read the entire section... the point is about what Wittman did with a single tank and no orders from his superiors. Yes, he had radio on that tank.
658.
by zeteo 15y ago
Most people haven't served in the military, but have you ever played a war game? Deciding where to move the weapons platforms and which objects are targets for what is the very essence of fighting a successful battle.
659.
by zeteo 15y ago
People have been making the argument that war makes no economic sense, and therefore won't happen, since at least 1898: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jan_Gotlib_Bloch#Research_and_a... Sixteen years later, they had the first world war.
660.
by zeteo 15y ago
The point is that the 10-20 seconds latency that was mentioned is not even close to covering the next planet, much less the entire solar system. Yes, you can send off a bunch of heat-seeking missiles, but, as I mentioned in my original post

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