That is such a load of bullshit, i hardly know where to start.
how about, that even IF climate change is man made (that's a big IF)
there is NO CREDIBLE way to link someone dieing in a storm to exxon.
The storm could have happened without climate change, the person could
have not walked into that torrent of water, there's no way to trace
emissions to a specific company as the cause for a storm or any kind of
weather.
It just shows the absurd claims global warming cult members will make in order to feel self righteous.
Keep
in mind that groups like this try to make their way to the top of the
news by making outlandish statements... The bolder the statements, the
easier it is to get people to listen to them... Statements like these
are nothing new...
With that being said, on the political side,
I clearly see a shift coming at some point... Meaning, more people are
feeling that their lives are being actively manipulated by
corporations, and manytimes they are probably right. Actually, the
original 1960's "movement" was to combat exactly this, meaning a focus
on self-reliance. Unfortunately, though, all of this has been lost thru
time with the only things remembered now being drugs and free love
crap..
Also,
please be kind on my personal perspective of the 1960's
counterculture... I certainly am not looking to offend, and It is only
my personal opinion. I certainly do not try to push myself as some sort
of expert...:-)
The
"Health and climate scientists at the University of Wisconsin at
Madison" say so, so it must be true. Heaven knows that UW Madison isn't
as left-wing, America-hating, and socialist as a university can get. Oh
wait, maybe it is...
Oh well, this is slashdot, so the cultists modded you down for not subscribing to the hive mentality.
yep,
that's about it. ever notice that stats like that are nice round
numbers. if they had actual facts, wouldn't the figure be 150,001, not
a neat 150,000? oh thats because they don't really know THEY ARE JUST
MAKING SHIT UP.
Not
saying that I agree with those numbers but you don't know much about
statistics or uncertainties. You don't even know much about significant
figures! Every measurement has an uncertainty. Sometimes this
uncertainty is small and sometimes it is large. If you go to the
butcher and ask for 1kg of meat, The guy will charge you for 1kg but
you won't get 1kg, probably something like 1.002 (probably worse).
Governments regulate this sort of thing and that's why there are large
and costly institutions like NIST (in the USA).
I did not read the paper that was mentioned but if it was published in
a scientific journal it will probably mention somewhere the uncertainty
value. So the actual number is something like 150.000 +/- 50.000 with a
probability of 90% (there are other ways to declare the uncertainty).
Now these hypothetical numbers mean that the actual number of deaths
could be larger than 200.000 or lower than 100.000 but the probability
of the number being outside the given range is close to 10%. 150.000 is
just the "nice" number closest most likely number.
If you want to question the numbers, the way to go about it is to
question the sampling techniques. That's how polls and research is
usually manipulated. They certainly didn't go around the world
determining what cause each death. The sample used to get these numbers
could be biased (counting only the deaths near some sort of disaster
for instance). Good sampling is *really* hard if not impossible. To get
a good sample it takes a lot of experience, deep knowledge of the
subject under study and a lot of honesty.
BTW, didn't your high school physics teacher tell you to drop all those
digits of the calculator display?
Have you hear the story about this fellow that was working in a
museum with dinosaurs and fossils. One day while showing a
group of visitors around he explains "This item is 50 million years and
6 months old". "Wow, so you can determine age that accurate!". "Yes,
because when I started here it was 50 million years old, and that is
half a year ago".
150,000 absolutely sounds like a number of proper accuracy in this case.
If 150,000 is a correct number is another matter (I do not know).
Remember, 68.42% of all statistics express a higher degree of accuracy
than there actually is.
The 150,000 is not an indicator that they're "making stuff up". In fact, if anything, it's an indicator that they're not. As a general rule, it's the whackos and crazies who claim to measure huge system effects to absurdly high resolution.
Clearly, for this number, it is a statistical estimate, the grungy output of which is then rounded to a convenient near number.
The Darfur conflict is largely fueled by desertification brought on partly by climate change. Here are some 2005 estimates: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A124 85-2005Apr23.html [washingtonpost.com]. Things have not gotten any better since then, but the deaths
have become harder to count.
Hummm...
The Gaia hypothesis is the only one I know with "active" control. More
vulcanism produces more exposed rock I suppose but the basic fractional
level of CO2 in the atmosphere is set biologically. It seems to me that
there are some cycles, largely orbital, but this is forcing rather than
control.
Also, the washington post is known to be a liberal newspaper.
Such arguments are called ad hominem [wikipedia.org] and
if you want to be taken serious you should not use those. Actually, you should not
use such arguments in any case whatsoever. Please stop.
Good
point. Hope you'll say the same when people point out that scientists
that question global warming are 'not climatologists' or 'have accepted
money from big oil'.
Good point. Hope you'll say the same when people point out that scientists
that question global warming are 'not climatologists' or 'have accepted
money from big oil'.
Hopefully I will, "not climatologists" sounds like possible ad hominem.
If someone is accused of having received money from oil industry this
does not necessarily mean an ad hominem attack. It could be, if it is
just blown of as "this or these persons are not trustworthy", but you
receive money and support from your "friends" (in lack of a better word),
and since you tend to treat friends better than non-friends this will give
some bias. When Microsoft founds some research, say about total cost of
ownership, you do not expect that not to influence the results, do you?
So questioning funding and support is often valid, ad hominem is not.
I guess that there is a mixture of both usually.
You
bring up a good point and I would like to add to it. Don't complain
that ExxonMobil is satisfying a demand that it has not created. It's
like trying to blame companies in the automotive industries for
automobile accidents. It's not their fault that some people use their
products improperly. If any of the oil companies scaled back production
or stopped, a global depression would most likely be created and we
would see the beginnings of a new Dark Age. If you don't like oil, move
to a city and start walking or using public transportation.
Centralization both limits destruction of open space and the energy
that is required to move people to where they have to be. I know that
might be beyond what some people are willing to do, but it's the only
real solution.
On a somewhat related note, I think it's ironic
that many of the environmentalists that I have met also use drugs. I
have absolutely no problem with drugs fundamentally since I think
people should be allowed to do what they wish, but I do have a problem
when they are illegal and their illegal distribution fuels crime and
terrorism. It's pretty hypocritical to blame companies for altering the
environment when illegal drug trafficking causes millions of people to
suffer everyday.
"Don't complain that ExxonMobil is satisfying a demand that it has not created."
That's
completely false. ExxonMobil and the other Gas/Oil companies are
directly in league with the automobile companies. Their chairmen serve
on each other boards. They cooperate in the "buying-up" of alternative
energy tech, and soaking up federal tax dollars via grant monies and
tax breaks. Ie. They do everything they can to perpetuate demand for
their product.
Your rational on the use of illicit drugs is also
mis-oriented. All of the crime and much of the suffering comes not from
the drugs, but from unconscionable laws. These laws hike prices, which
empower suppliers, crowd prisons, encourage youth, corrupt law agencies
and severely depress accessibility to rehabilitation.
BTW, I don't own a car --refuse to own a petrol powered car, and don't live in a city.
That's
completely false. ExxonMobil and the other Gas/Oil companies are
directly in league with the automobile companies. Their chairmen serve
on each other boards.
Really? Because according to his bio at
ExxonMobile's site, Rex W. Tillerson (the Chairman of ExxonMobile)
doesn't sit on the boards of any automobile manufacturers. He does sit
on a number of non-profit and NGO boards, though.
That is such a load of bullshit, i hardly know where to start.
how
about, that even IF climate change is man made (that's a big IF) there
is NO CREDIBLE way to link someone dieing in a storm to exxon. The
storm could have happened without climate change, the person could have
not walked into that torrent of water, there's no way to trace
emissions to a specific company as the cause for a storm or any kind of
weather.
It just shows the absurd claims global warming cult members will make in order to feel self righteous.
You weren't modded down for disbelieving in global warming, you were
modded down for being dickish about it. Global warming cult members?
Fine, I'll give you that, only so long as you concede membership in the
Flat Earth Society.
You know why people get pissed off with
positions such as yours? Because there's a long history of the
pro-corporate or pro-money side of the argument being utter bullshit.
This can lead to some mistakes of bias such as automatically assuming
the government is lying whenever a claim is made. But consider the
history of lies we've seen. The air at Ground Zero is perfectly
safe...except people are dying now. The Iraq WMD intel was a slam dunk,
only we now have 100% proven fact that it was all fabricated in support
of a war Bush already planned to fight back when he said he was still
gathering evidence. Tobacco companies insisted for years that
cigarettes were neither addictive nor harmful. Free markets and
deregulation work except for rare instances like Enron and everything
else where they don't.
When it comes right down to it, we're not
talking about a complicated issue where honest people fall into two
different camps and are interested solely in discovering the truth of
the matter. Global warming is just another issue where 99.9% of
apolitical experts find themselves on one side of the issue and the
corporate-sponsored.1% find themselves on the other
side. Then you end up with conservative flacks taking up the banner of
the corporations as if that's the patriotic thing to do.
I have
no idea what your opinion on health care is but I bet you hate France
and think Michael Moore's SiCKO is just a bunch of hippie propaganda.
I'm not going to try and convince you that France's health care system
is perfect, I'm sure there are flaws. But is it working better than
ours at this point? More importantly, if we're the best fucking country
on the planet, shouldn't we be able to provide the best fucking health
care on the planet? And don't even try to tell me what we have is good
right now, that just means you're divorced from reality. Even the
staunchest conservative should be able to agree with that point, "we
should be able to do better than France."
I
haven't done the research, but 150,000 climate change related deaths a
year just triggers my bullshit sensor. It's like those anti-smoking ads
which say that smoking causes asthma... uh, yeah, that explains why
there are so many asthma cases now (when people don't smoke) as opposed
to decades past (when many, many more people smoked.) I think my
bullshit sensor is pretty well-tuned.
I haven't done the research, but 150,000 climate change related deaths a year just triggers my bullshit sensor.
I don't know why. It only amounts to ~0.25% of the deaths in the world.
I don't think it's so incredible to believe that 1 out of 4000 deaths
might be due to climate change, particularly given the fraction of the
world population in the third world, far more susceptible than we are
to drought, tropical disease, crop failure, etc.
"Based on respected scientific opinion that a well-documented
rise in global temperatures and attendant climatological and
environmental changes have resulted from a significant increase in the
atmospheric concentration of "greenhouse gases"..."
Apparently
our conservative, let's overturn Roe vs. Wade and Brown vs.Board of
Education, actually thinks climate change is real. But then they read
their science briefs.
(I'll agree that pinning numbers of deaths
to it is all going to be in how you bother to count. But I'm really
surprised you aren't modded as flamebait.)
how about, that even IF climate change is man made (that's a big IF)
It's not really that big of an "if" anymore. The big "if" is how much of it will occur in the future.
how
about, that even IF climate change is man made (that's a big IF) there
is NO CREDIBLE way to link someone dieing in a storm to exxon.
No one is linking any particular storm to climate change. You can,
however, link changes in storm, crop growth, precipitation, etc. trends
to climate change, and you can link storms, crop growth, and
precipitation statistics to deaths.
yeah, welcome to/. moderators: They think "Troll" is the same as "person who I disagree with."
Trolling
is generally defined as saying something assholish to get replies ("why
the fuck would anyone use vi?" or "why the fuck would anyone use emacs"
for examples). While flamebait is trying to instigate a flamewar, like:
"vi is clearly better than emacs because it has a simpler interface" or
"emacs is better because it has more features." Off-topic -- well, if
you can't figure that one out, you ought not be moderating, or even on
slashdot. The closest to "-1 I disagree" is Overrated.
This
works both ways; there are also moderations in the UPWARD direction
that make no sense. This article has a few already. Generally, saying
bad things about corporations (unless you're twitter) or Bush can get
you moderated up unless you have zero tact. (Seriously, we all know
Bush is a fucking moron. Just a year and a half left, and he's gone.)
Sometimes
saying *good* things about people we *really hate*, like the RIAA, gets
you moderated up. I think this is because mods just get so shocked
their brains cease to function correctly.
Also, there are six
billion people on this planet. 150,000 people die about every
twenty-four hours. It's not going to affect us. Human beings like to
reproduce. We're in no danger of dying off with such a small number of
deaths. You want to impress me? Add three zeroes to that number. Then
I'll concede we're in trouble. Maybe I'm just jaded, but people die
every day for stupid reasons. People have been dying since there were
people. All this hand wringing and fretting isn't doing any good --
either work to solve problems, or shut up. But don't be an asshole
about it. Besides, if you want to be really cynical, eventually, the
universe will reach maximum entropy (if you believe the Heat Death
theory).
Or if 700 million net new people in eight years just frightens you.
I
don't like the rate at which our population is growing. There's no
political reasoning behind it. No global warming fear or anything. I
just wish people would fuck less.
But
the growth rate is only a concern if we're near carrying capacity, or
are in danger of reaching it soon. Are we? I've heard hysterical
shouting to that effect, but seen little hard evidence. Or are we just
superstitious enough to get frightened by large numbers?
It's more that the rate itself is growing, and speeding up, not that we're reaching a capacity. I'm not really worried, I'm just not all that fond of people.;)
All of the following assumes my late-night-math hasn't been affected by alcohol:
700
million net gain in eight years with 6 billion is 11.67% gain in
population. That's 1.46% growth a year. That's not so bad, really. If
it keeps up, and the rate of increase doesn't change per year, that
means once we reach 10 billion, in two years we will have a net gain
nearly equal to the population of the United States at present. That's
a little bit scary to think about. I'm not about to do the math to
figure out when we'll hit 10 billion, but it will most likely be in my
life time.
The
interesting thing is, if you look at population growth rates from
around the world, wealthier and more advanced countries have lower (and
by lower I mean zero or negative) rates. Does this mean that if we
develop the entire world to a first-world standard of living, world
population will stop growing or go down? Yes, and since we should
develop the entire world to that state anyway, it's only more reason to
try it and find out. With luck, the world population will diminish in
the far future, we may never reach 10 billion, and we might end up in a
steady state of oscillation--when resources are so plentiful that we
can have tons of kids on the cheap, we will, and then our children
won't afford to have as many children. Or, we could find that some
currently-impoverished culture is an exception to the "prosperity = low
birth rate" theory, and they will take over the world.
Not
for food, but for fuel and water, *IF* the whole world would ahve a
first world standard of living and particulary all sort of fuel
consumption the US have. If you do not believe me compare per-head US
consumption, with the whole world production, the multiply by 6
billion. Sorry. 6.7 Nillion now. And for some stuff (like crude) the
production is growing slowlier (or even going down) quicker than human
grwoth so it ain't going to be better.
Now if you take the
average 3rd world consumption and make it stay constant per head, then
I agree with you this is scare mongering. But such an hypothese seems
to be completly belied by the fact that two of the most populated
country on earth are making stride toward MROE consumption, not less.
But feel free not to be concerned. I bet you live in a first world
country.
Trolling
is generally defined as saying something assholish to get replies ("why
the fuck would anyone use vi?" or "why the fuck would anyone use emacs"
for examples).
Here's another example: "It just shows the absurd claims emacs cult members will make in order to feel self righteous."
First,
we don't actually know that Exxon complained to the ISP, because the
ISP did the takedown "in reaction to a complaint whose source they will
not identify." You can argue that it's likely to be Exxon, but the fact
is nobody knows.
Second, filing a complaint with an ISP is not the sort of action one implied by "Brute Squad".
Third, there was no hacking involved.
You
know, the only way to improve this headline would have been to name a
group other than the Yes Men as the ones who were cut off.
Yeah,
but if they didn't use such an inflammatory title, we wouldn't get 200+
posts (pageviews, baby!) of people bitching about the loss of free
speech, "only in America!", and due to the "climate change" part, we
get to have YET ANOTHER global warming thread on/.!
Really, it's gold all around for people who want to bitch about America/Bush/global warming.
I'm
more interested in naming and shaming the shit ISP who simply collapsed
after one threat. Their name isn't even in the summary (as of the time
of this posting). That should be the headline:
"Broadview Networks a bunch of pussies, shut down website after complaint made."
Or we could go with something less inflammatory (although with "Brute Squad" and "Hacks" in the title of this one...):
"Yes Men bash Exxon; Broadbiew Networks shut them down and refuse to reveal source of complaint."
Too long?
"Broadview Networks shut down YesMen after single mystery complaint."
Seriously -- headlines like this article's are not good for Slashdot. It's inflammatory, and it's stupid.
I
do believe that corporations in the US expect to be treated as a
"person" under national and international law. The problem with this
assumption is that if a person, even a head of state, murders 100
people, or even destroys massive property, such in the case Exxon
Valdez, that person can be significantly inconvenienced, while
corporation can evade punishment for ever. And if the corporation is
given the ultimate punishment, as in the case of Arthur Anderson, the
political reprecusions tend to much more significant than when the
equivalent human thug is punished by state sponsored killing.
On the other side of the argument there are persons who believe
corporations should have no rights at all. These people believe that
they can say the Microsoft sponsors the mass killing of anyone who
disagrees with them. This is ok a the accusation is so extreme that no
one would believe, so it is clearly satire. The problem, of course, is
where to draw the line. Is it ok to say that MS regularly sanctions
threats of any medium ranking figure who threatens their monopoly?
Where does satire end and stock manipulation begin?
Ultimately, I think we get into the nature of satire, and the
death of the art form. Traditional satire abstracts some tyranical
figure that is simply to dangerous to attack directly, and cleverly
illustrates the tyranny and negative impact of the figure. Or satire
highlights some social policy, and then proposes a ridiculous solution
to it. Satire is useless when launched at figures that can be attacked
directly or when is simply attributes characteristics that the figure
probably does not possess.
It saddens me that meaningless verbal attack is put forth as
satire. In this case the article could have proposed that ExxonMobile
convert the people into a product. Such a modest proposal would not be
original, but at least would be an attempt at satire, rather than just
the ranting of thugs. Or they could have attributed the action to
Butthole Petrol Incompentated(BPI), or EXpat Oil Nation MOBlized , or
whatever. Just make it interesting satire, not school house insults.
by Anonymous Coward
on Saturday June 30, @09:27PM (#19702669)
So
you think Exxon didn't get punished for the Valdez accident? You're a
lying sack of shit. It cost them hundreds of millions of dollars in
direct costs, and billions (yes, with a "B") in indirect costs; thing
about the legislative changes that doubled the cost of production on
the north slope. And, by the way, wasn't the accident the fault of the
ship's captain, who's responsibility is the ship, crew and cargo? Yes,
he was accused of being an alcoholic. Guess what, in the US, you can't
fire someone for being accused of having a disease. That's the law. You
go shut up and play with your crayons.
I
think the point of the Yes Men's "performances" is to make the people
present realize that they can easily go over their own ethical
boundaries. Maybe they'll pay more attention to their own ethics after
that.
I do believe that corporations in the US expect to be treated as a "person" under national and international law.
You start your argument with a wrong assumption.
Corporations
(in the US and elsewhere) employ entire squads of lawyers whose sole
job it is to navigate the most profitable path through the jungle of
laws. That includes demanding to be treated as a "person" whenever it is profitable to do so, and on the other hand demanding to be treated as a purely legal entity whenever that is more profitable.
One day after the Yes Men made a joke announcement of ExxonMobil's plans to turn billions of climate-change victims (hypothetical, unlikely premise, original research)
into a brand-new fuel called Vivoleum, the Yes Men's upstream internet
service provider shut down Vivoleum.com and cut off the Yes Men's email
service, in reaction to a complaint whose source they will not
identify. 'Since parody is protected under US law, Exxon must think
that people seeing the site will think Vivoleum's a real Exxon product,
not just a parody,' said Yes Man Mike Bonanno (conjecture). Exxon's policies do already contribute to 150,000 climate-change related deaths each year,' (highly suspect claim, no evidence given to support) added Yes Man Andy Bichlbaum. 'So maybe it really is credible. What a resource!'
Firstly,
if the ISP received a DMCA section 512 take down notice for the
content, they should give the customer the full details of that notice.
Secondly,
if they didn't receive a section 512 take down notice, they should have
asked for one (thats assuming that the ISP was told to take the content
down for copyright reasons, if it was for other reasons, there are
other procedures to be followed)
At the end of July, Thing.net will terminate its contract with Broadview and move its operations to Germany, where internet expression currently benefits from a friendlier legal climate than in the US,
I
think these people are in for a rude awakening. AFAIK, Germany doesn't
even have a parody exemption, and mere mention of a corporate trademark
on your web site can make you subject to large fines.
If you
want to get this kind of message out, don't introduce a single point of
failure (web hosting). Instead, make it funny, put it in the form of a
press release, make it easy to cut-and-paste, and people will be
mailing it around widely. Bonus points if you can get various news
wires to pick it up. If you need pictures, make them free of any
trademarks, potential copyright issues, or other obstacles and you can
host them on Flickr.
The
speed of the takedown has more to do with the power of lawyers than the
power of corporations. If the ISP wants to take advantage of the "CYA"
safe harbor afforded them by the DMCA and other similar laws, they have
to comply with takedown notices without delay.
If the notice came from a credible lawyer for an individual, it would still have to be honored.
From
the article: "Willie Soon of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for
Astrophysics and his colleagues question whether polar bear populations
really are declining and if sea ice, on which the animals hunt, will
actually disappear as quickly as climate models predict" Climate change sceptics criticise polar bear science [newscientist.com]
Oh,
fuck all the politics. These guys are funny! I mean, from giving a
presentation to a food service industry convenstion about McDonald's
making their new hamburgers from the shit of their customers' to
this... Come on! It's FUNNY!!!
If you need to shout it's funny, it probably isn't so much.
I'd certainly call it funny if they produced the parody and uploaded
it, but they didn't. They tricked someone into fronting the expenses
for their stage and audience and did "performance art".
Not funny when it costs someone else's money. More like parasitism.
i
dont like the yes men either. i tend to agree with their positions, but
i feel like they ultimately hurt their cause because they wind up
looking like idiots and don't change any minds but just serve as
entertainment for the most die hard of leftists.
nevertheless,
their internet connection was turned off because exxon didnt like what
they were saying. it's kind of disconcerting. had this been any group
conservative, liberal or otherwise it is troubling that they can be
wiped off the face of the internet.
that's why it's news for nerds and why you're flamebait.
Ok
their internet connection was turned off at the request of unrevealed
people, without a criminal charge or notification. There isn't even an
attempt at establishing any kind of proper authority, just a command
from someone powerful enough to make it happen. That's far worse than
Exxon (or someone acting in Exxon's interests) being required to take
this act publicly.
So,
kind of like a MUD (toading), or IRC (kicking)... Somebody with
superuser privileges took a dislike to them. At least used to happen
all the time all over the internet. The difference is that now the
channel op isn't "one of us".
by Anonymous Coward
on Saturday June 30, @09:28PM (#19702677)
That's purely conjecture at this point.
"Broadview did restore both IPs on Wednesday, after the Vivoleum.com website was completely disabled and all mention of Exxon was removed from TheYesMen.org."
I
just love how the three UK terror attacks (well, two were *attempted*
attacks) have received ABSOLUTELY ZERO coverage on Slashdot, but this
small story is front-page news here.
I'm sure that if the two cars loaded with explosives would have had WiFi triggers rather than plain old cell phone triggers it would have shown up on/. Better yet, if those cars were full of Vivoleum instead of gasoline Exxon could have sent their Brute Squad after the bastards that planted those bombs.
Of course, it would be horribly ironic if they came forward and claimed they did it as retaliation against their ISP.
Just
wait... Someone will point out that if the bombing plots had just used
an iPhone then it would have been 10X easier to actually complete their
plan...
Better
yet, if those cars were full of Vivoleum instead of gasoline Exxon
could have sent their Brute Squad after the bastards that planted those
bombs.
It's very important to stop terrorism.
Anyone filling their car with gasoline is a potential criminal and should expect to be arrested.
by Anonymous Coward
on Saturday June 30, @07:32PM (#19702369)
Those
stories are sufficiently covered in other Media. If you want to read
about those stories you can go there. Not all news stories need be
covered in all types of media.
150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2, Insightful)how about, that even IF climate change is man made (that's a big IF) there is NO CREDIBLE way to link someone dieing in a storm to exxon. The storm could have happened without climate change, the person could have not walked into that torrent of water, there's no way to trace emissions to a specific company as the cause for a storm or any kind of weather.
It just shows the absurd claims global warming cult members will make in order to feel self righteous.
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)With that being said, on the political side, I clearly see a shift coming at some point... Meaning, more people are feeling that their lives are being actively manipulated by corporations, and manytimes they are probably right. Actually, the original 1960's "movement" was to combat exactly this, meaning a focus on self-reliance. Unfortunately, though, all of this has been lost thru time with the only things remembered now being drugs and free love crap..
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2, Troll)Oh well, this is slashdot, so the cultists modded you down for not subscribing to the hive mentality.
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:1, Troll)Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:1)Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)150,000 absolutely sounds like a number of proper accuracy in this case. If 150,000 is a correct number is another matter (I do not know).
Remember, 68.42% of all statistics express a higher degree of accuracy than there actually is.
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)(http://www.ubidubium.net/ | Last Journal: Saturday August 24, @12:47AM)
The 150,000 is not an indicator that they're "making stuff up". In fact, if anything, it's an indicator that they're not. As a general rule, it's the whackos and crazies who claim to measure huge system effects to absurdly high resolution.
Clearly, for this number, it is a statistical estimate, the grungy output of which is then rounded to a convenient near number.
Why not start here?
(Score:2)(http://www.jointhesolution.com/mdsolar | Last Journal: Friday February 23, @04:53AM)
Their are deaths that can be even more directly tied to warming: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/04/doom.html [blogspot.com] as well. You should look into things a little more closely I think.
--
Get affordable solar power: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
Re:Why not start here?
(Score:3, Funny)(http://www.jointhesolution.com/mdsolar | Last Journal: Friday February 23, @04:53AM)
But seriously, read the article and see if malnutrition is not mentioned.
Are you thinking of the Gaia hypothesis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_hypothesis [wikipedia.org] as your control mechanism?
Re:Why not start here?
(Score:2)(http://www.jointhesolution.com/mdsolar | Last Journal: Friday February 23, @04:53AM)
Re:Why not start here?
(Score:2)Re:Why not start here?
(Score:1)Re:Why not start here?
(Score:2)Hopefully I will, "not climatologists" sounds like possible ad hominem. If someone is accused of having received money from oil industry this does not necessarily mean an ad hominem attack. It could be, if it is just blown of as "this or these persons are not trustworthy", but you receive money and support from your "friends" (in lack of a better word), and since you tend to treat friends better than non-friends this will give some bias. When Microsoft founds some research, say about total cost of ownership, you do not expect that not to influence the results, do you?
So questioning funding and support is often valid, ad hominem is not. I guess that there is a mixture of both usually.
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)(http://wister.org/)
On a somewhat related note, I think it's ironic that many of the environmentalists that I have met also use drugs. I have absolutely no problem with drugs fundamentally since I think people should be allowed to do what they wish, but I do have a problem when they are illegal and their illegal distribution fuels crime and terrorism. It's pretty hypocritical to blame companies for altering the environment when illegal drug trafficking causes millions of people to suffer everyday.
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2, Insightful)(http://weblands.blogspot.com/)
That's completely false. ExxonMobil and the other Gas/Oil companies are directly in league with the automobile companies. Their chairmen serve on each other boards. They cooperate in the "buying-up" of alternative energy tech, and soaking up federal tax dollars via grant monies and tax breaks. Ie. They do everything they can to perpetuate demand for their product.
Your rational on the use of illicit drugs is also mis-oriented. All of the crime and much of the suffering comes not from the drugs, but from unconscionable laws. These laws hike prices, which empower suppliers, crowd prisons, encourage youth, corrupt law agencies and severely depress accessibility to rehabilitation.
BTW, I don't own a car --refuse to own a petrol powered car, and don't live in a city.
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:1)(http://oenophilia.typepad.com/ | Last Journal: Tuesday June 05, @11:29AM)
Details:http://www.exxonmobil.com/Corporate/About
Looks like you're wrong about that one, at least.
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)(http://slashdot.org/ | Last Journal: Wednesday January 04, @10:14PM)
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:3, Insightful)how about, that even IF climate change is man made (that's a big IF) there is NO CREDIBLE way to link someone dieing in a storm to exxon. The storm could have happened without climate change, the person could have not walked into that torrent of water, there's no way to trace emissions to a specific company as the cause for a storm or any kind of weather.
It just shows the absurd claims global warming cult members will make in order to feel self righteous.
You know why people get pissed off with positions such as yours? Because there's a long history of the pro-corporate or pro-money side of the argument being utter bullshit. This can lead to some mistakes of bias such as automatically assuming the government is lying whenever a claim is made. But consider the history of lies we've seen. The air at Ground Zero is perfectly safe...except people are dying now. The Iraq WMD intel was a slam dunk, only we now have 100% proven fact that it was all fabricated in support of a war Bush already planned to fight back when he said he was still gathering evidence. Tobacco companies insisted for years that cigarettes were neither addictive nor harmful. Free markets and deregulation work except for rare instances like Enron and everything else where they don't.
When it comes right down to it, we're not talking about a complicated issue where honest people fall into two different camps and are interested solely in discovering the truth of the matter. Global warming is just another issue where 99.9% of apolitical experts find themselves on one side of the issue and the corporate-sponsored
I have no idea what your opinion on health care is but I bet you hate France and think Michael Moore's SiCKO is just a bunch of hippie propaganda. I'm not going to try and convince you that France's health care system is perfect, I'm sure there are flaws. But is it working better than ours at this point? More importantly, if we're the best fucking country on the planet, shouldn't we be able to provide the best fucking health care on the planet? And don't even try to tell me what we have is good right now, that just means you're divorced from reality. Even the staunchest conservative should be able to agree with that point, "we should be able to do better than France."
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:1)Hey, you, the guy reading this. If you hadn't been born, hurricane Katrina wouldn't have happened. Thanks a lot!
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)Is that any worse than posting rants on slashdot to feel self-righteous? Just curious.
Did you miss that Supreme Court decision?
(Score:1)(Last Journal: Tuesday October 12, @05:33PM)
"Based on respected scientific opinion that a well-documented rise in global temperatures and attendant climatological and environmental changes have resulted from a significant increase in the atmospheric concentration of "greenhouse gases"
Apparently our conservative, let's overturn Roe vs. Wade and Brown vs.Board of Education, actually thinks climate change is real. But then they read their science briefs.
(I'll agree that pinning numbers of deaths to it is all going to be in how you bother to count. But I'm really surprised you aren't modded as flamebait.)
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:5, Informative)Trolling is generally defined as saying something assholish to get replies ("why the fuck would anyone use vi?" or "why the fuck would anyone use emacs" for examples). While flamebait is trying to instigate a flamewar, like: "vi is clearly better than emacs because it has a simpler interface" or "emacs is better because it has more features." Off-topic -- well, if you can't figure that one out, you ought not be moderating, or even on slashdot. The closest to "-1 I disagree" is Overrated.
This works both ways; there are also moderations in the UPWARD direction that make no sense. This article has a few already. Generally, saying bad things about corporations (unless you're twitter) or Bush can get you moderated up unless you have zero tact. (Seriously, we all know Bush is a fucking moron. Just a year and a half left, and he's gone.)
Sometimes saying *good* things about people we *really hate*, like the RIAA, gets you moderated up. I think this is because mods just get so shocked their brains cease to function correctly.
Also, there are six billion people on this planet. 150,000 people die about every twenty-four hours. It's not going to affect us. Human beings like to reproduce. We're in no danger of dying off with such a small number of deaths. You want to impress me? Add three zeroes to that number. Then I'll concede we're in trouble. Maybe I'm just jaded, but people die every day for stupid reasons. People have been dying since there were people. All this hand wringing and fretting isn't doing any good -- either work to solve problems, or shut up. But don't be an asshole about it. Besides, if you want to be really cynical, eventually, the universe will reach maximum entropy (if you believe the Heat Death theory).
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:3, Informative)(http://newswall.org.uk/)
6 billion in 1999, 6.7 billion now, scary isn't it.
http://www.ibiblio.org/lunarbin/worldpop [ibiblio.org]
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)(http://philwelch.net/)
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)I don't like the rate at which our population is growing. There's no political reasoning behind it. No global warming fear or anything. I just wish people would fuck less.
Or video tape it more. Either way...
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)(http://philwelch.net/)
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)All of the following assumes my late-night-math hasn't been affected by alcohol:
700 million net gain in eight years with 6 billion is 11.67% gain in population. That's 1.46% growth a year. That's not so bad, really. If it keeps up, and the rate of increase doesn't change per year, that means once we reach 10 billion, in two years we will have a net gain nearly equal to the population of the United States at present. That's a little bit scary to think about. I'm not about to do the math to figure out when we'll hit 10 billion, but it will most likely be in my life time.
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:2)(http://philwelch.net/)
We are beyonf carrying capacity
(Score:2)Now if you take the average 3rd world consumption and make it stay constant per head, then I agree with you this is scare mongering. But such an hypothese seems to be completly belied by the fact that two of the most populated country on earth are making stride toward MROE consumption, not less. But feel free not to be concerned. I bet you live in a first world country.
Re:150,000 deaths per year
(Score:3, Informative)Here's another example: "It just shows the absurd claims emacs cult members will make in order to feel self righteous."
Hmmm... that looks somehow familiar.
Nice headline, guys!
(Score:5, Insightful)(http://jargon-file.org/)
Second, filing a complaint with an ISP is not the sort of action one implied by "Brute Squad".
Third, there was no hacking involved.
You know, the only way to improve this headline would have been to name a group other than the Yes Men as the ones who were cut off.
Re:Nice headline, guys!
(Score:5, Funny)(http://jargon-file.org/)
1) We know the Yes Men have previously masqueraded as ExxonMobil executives.
2) This takedown has generated additional publicity for the Yes Men.
Wouldn't it have been a master stroke by the Yes Men if they had faked their own ISP into taking them down by making the complaint themselves?
Re:Nice headline, guys!
(Score:2)(http://www.animal-assist.org/donate.html)
Re:Nice headline, guys!
(Score:2)Really, it's gold all around for people who want to bitch about America/Bush/global warming.
I'm more interested in naming and shaming the shit ISP who simply collapsed after one threat. Their name isn't even in the summary (as of the time of this posting). That should be the headline:
"Broadview Networks a bunch of pussies, shut down website after complaint made."
Or we could go with something less inflammatory (although with "Brute Squad" and "Hacks" in the title of this one...):
"Yes Men bash Exxon; Broadbiew Networks shut them down and refuse to reveal source of complaint."
Too long?
"Broadview Networks shut down YesMen after single mystery complaint."
Seriously -- headlines like this article's are not good for Slashdot. It's inflammatory, and it's stupid.
Re:Nice headline, guys!
(Score:2)(http://mattozan.net/)
I'm on the Brute Squad...
Re:Nice headline, guys!
(Score:2)(http://slashdot.org/ | Last Journal: Friday July 29, @01:12PM)
nature of satire
(Score:5, Interesting)(Last Journal: Thursday May 03, @12:34PM)
On the other side of the argument there are persons who believe corporations should have no rights at all. These people believe that they can say the Microsoft sponsors the mass killing of anyone who disagrees with them. This is ok a the accusation is so extreme that no one would believe, so it is clearly satire. The problem, of course, is where to draw the line. Is it ok to say that MS regularly sanctions threats of any medium ranking figure who threatens their monopoly? Where does satire end and stock manipulation begin?
Ultimately, I think we get into the nature of satire, and the death of the art form. Traditional satire abstracts some tyranical figure that is simply to dangerous to attack directly, and cleverly illustrates the tyranny and negative impact of the figure. Or satire highlights some social policy, and then proposes a ridiculous solution to it. Satire is useless when launched at figures that can be attacked directly or when is simply attributes characteristics that the figure probably does not possess.
It saddens me that meaningless verbal attack is put forth as satire. In this case the article could have proposed that ExxonMobile convert the people into a product. Such a modest proposal would not be original, but at least would be an attempt at satire, rather than just the ranting of thugs. Or they could have attributed the action to Butthole Petrol Incompentated(BPI), or EXpat Oil Nation MOBlized , or whatever. Just make it interesting satire, not school house insults.
Oh Wait...
(Score:2)(http://www.jointhesolution.com/mdsolar | Last Journal: Friday February 23, @04:53AM)
How about Vivoleum(TM)?
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Turning sunlight(TM) into a product: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
Re:nature of satire
(Score:1, Informative)Re:nature of satire
(Score:2)Re:nature of satire
(Score:3, Insightful)(http://web.lemuria.org/)
Corporations (in the US and elsewhere) employ entire squads of lawyers whose sole job it is to navigate the most profitable path through the jungle of laws. That includes demanding to be treated as a "person" whenever it is profitable to do so, and on the other hand demanding to be treated as a purely legal entity whenever that is more profitable.
Why This isn't News, but Agitprop
(Score:2)Re:Why This isn't News, but Agitprop
(Score:2)(http://wakaba.c3.cx/)
Did the ISP do the right thing
(Score:3, Interesting)Secondly, if they didn't receive a section 512 take down notice, they should have asked for one (thats assuming that the ISP was told to take the content down for copyright reasons, if it was for other reasons, there are other procedures to be followed)
Maybe this had something to do with it...lol
(Score:1)(http://webhome.idirect.com/~kvollick/ | Last Journal: Sunday June 24, @04:02PM)
It is called contractual interference and it time
(Score:1)IANAL and therefore do not deserve to be shot, but here is the wikipedia entry.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tortious_interferenc
grass--greener
(Score:3, Informative)expression currently benefits from a friendlier legal climate than in the US,
I think these people are in for a rude awakening. AFAIK, Germany doesn't even have a parody exemption, and mere mention of a corporate trademark on your web site can make you subject to large fines.
If you want to get this kind of message out, don't introduce a single point of failure (web hosting). Instead, make it funny, put it in the form of a press release, make it easy to cut-and-paste, and people will be mailing it around widely. Bonus points if you can get various news wires to pick it up. If you need pictures, make them free of any trademarks, potential copyright issues, or other obstacles and you can host them on Flickr.
Who's their "upstream provider" ?
(Score:2)(http://www.mindonthenet.com/ | Last Journal: Thursday April 27, @08:47AM)
Just an example of the power of lawyers...
(Score:2)If the notice came from a credible lawyer for an individual, it would still have to be honored.
More anti-global warming funding from Exxon
(Score:1)(http://webhome.idirect.com/~kvollick/ | Last Journal: Sunday June 24, @04:02PM)
Re:News For Nerds How??!!
(Score:2, Insightful)(http://www.daduh.org/ | Last Journal: Thursday April 26, @05:25PM)
Re:News For Nerds How??!!
(Score:3, Insightful)I'd certainly call it funny if they produced the parody and uploaded it, but they didn't. They tricked someone into fronting the expenses for their stage and audience and did "performance art".
Not funny when it costs someone else's money. More like parasitism.
Re:News For Nerds How??!!
(Score:4, Interesting)See, that's the funny part.
Re:News For Nerds How??!!
(Score:1)because the retaliation was to disconnect them
(Score:5, Insightful)(http://slantdrilling.blogspot.com/)
nevertheless, their internet connection was turned off because exxon didnt like what they were saying. it's kind of disconcerting. had this been any group conservative, liberal or otherwise it is troubling that they can be wiped off the face of the internet.
that's why it's news for nerds and why you're flamebait.
Re:because the retaliation was to disconnect them
(Score:2)That's purely conjecture at this point.
Re:because the retaliation was to disconnect them
(Score:5, Interesting)(Last Journal: Friday January 26, @01:35PM)
Re:because the retaliation was to disconnect them
(Score:2)(http://www-cdf.fnal.gov/ | Last Journal: Wednesday June 13, @12:39PM)
Conjecture My Ass
(Score:5, Informative)"Broadview did restore both IPs on Wednesday, after the Vivoleum.com
website was completely disabled and all mention of Exxon was removed
from TheYesMen.org."
Mod Parent AC up
(Score:1)(http://swoolley.homeip.net/)
Why not provide information?
(Score:2)(http://www.jointhesolution.com/mdsolar | Last Journal: Friday February 23, @04:53AM)
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Convenient Solar Power: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
Re:because the retaliation was to disconnect them
(Score:1)(http://www.bladenforce.com/)
Re:News For Nerds How??!!
(Score:2)(http://www.animal-assist.org/donate.html)
Of course, it would be horribly ironic if they came forward and claimed they did it as retaliation against their ISP.
Re:News For Nerds How??!!
(Score:1)(http://www.acousticdev.com/ | Last Journal: Tuesday June 19, @08:35PM)
Re:News For Nerds How??!!
(Score:1)(Last Journal: Wednesday June 27, @10:37PM)
It's very important to stop terrorism.
Anyone filling their car with gasoline is a potential criminal and should expect to be arrested.
Re:News For Nerds How??!!
(Score:2)(Last Journal: Wednesday October 15, @06:16PM)
Re:News For Nerds How??!!
(Score:1, Insightful)Re:News For Nerds How??!!
(Score:2)Get this guy: "Exxon=no tech connection". I guess he's using solar power to run his WebTV. He must be so hi-tech he's running his Amigo on Brylcreem.
Re:News For Nerds How??!!
(Score:3, Funny)1. Wait about three weeks.
2. The terrorists used low tech non-functioning methods, and were noticeably inept. More of "your government at work" sort of stuff.
Re:News For Nerds How??!!
(Score:1)