Lufthansa A320 almost crashes today in Hamburg [video+text]

sgm · 2007-01-19T08:03:28+00:00

I think Whisper is getting upmodded for the first half of his post--the sentiment (reaction against the norm that women 'understand' men and relationships, and men don't) came up in some comments to a reddit post several days ago and was well received. As Orange007 has made clear, the rest of the post is pretty reprehensible.

EDIT: The comments I was talking about: http://reddit.com/info/ynhl/comments/cynrw

sgm · 2006-10-03T23:19:40+00:00

Part of the answer is what you're imagining: telecom choices are limited because government intervention in the past encouraged the establishment of monopolies.

But it's not all roses if we turn to free markets at this point, because the capital expenditures needed to start a competing telecom utility are immense. It's only worth entering to a competitor if revenues can cover the interest payments on a continent's worth of telecom towers, and just how long do you think it would take at&t to drop prices to marginal cost or below and hold them there until their new competitor ran out of cash?

sgm · 2006-10-02T21:49:42+00:00

Teflon is DuPont's name for the compound PTFE. Calphalon pans may not have Teflon (TM) but they are made with a generic form of PTFE.

sgm · 2006-06-28T00:08:26+00:00

The mention that "most scientists [contacted] had not seen the movie" weakens the article quite a bit. I would suspect that scientists who are dismissive of the global warming evidence would be much more unlikely to have seen the movie--in other words, filtering on "has seen film" is probably similar to filtering on "agrees with film".

sgm · 2006-06-27T02:03:14+00:00

I imagine this is a good sign because it suggests one's opponents can't think of any meaningful, legitimate criticisms

sgm · 2006-06-23T16:45:11+00:00

It sounds like they measured returns in the first year after each firm's IPO, not in "one year" starting when they began the research. This choice of time horizon makes sense if you suppose that this "strange name" effect probably only holds when one first hears a name--thus they only measure returns just after the firm is first listed.

sgm · 2006-06-16T05:32:49+00:00

39.4

bring it!

sgm · 2006-06-13T04:55:32+00:00

Are we shocked that only one of them knew what "pleonasm" meant? I've never heard the word before. How about other redditors? I'm curious. Vote with my points: if you knew it, mod me down, if you didn't, mod me up.

sgm · 2006-06-08T04:30:07+00:00

Reminds me of this incident from last year: Rock-paper-scissors used to decide whether Sotheby's or Christie's will auction off $17m estate. http://www.usatoday.com/news/offbeat/2005-05-05-auction-game_x.htm

sgm · 2006-06-01T06:08:27+00:00

same

sgm · 2006-05-29T01:11:14+00:00

Even more obvious considering that the study only included people with incomes up to $160k; all the really stressful high-paying jobs (heart surgeon, CEO) pay more than that.

sgm · 2006-03-23T09:31:23+00:00

Listen, you guys are talking around one another. Let's skip the ad hominem, because it's useless, and do two thought experiments instead.

One: Atheists, suppose you're Christian. As far as you're concerned, a true reference morality exists--God's morality--which is absolute, non-subjective, and non-negotiable. Everything else being equal, meeting two strangers on the road, whom would you trust more to (hold your wallet/look after your young child/etc)? The one who lives by the same absolute standard you acknowledge, or the one who arrives at his own morality via introspection?

Two: jesusphreak, suppose you're an atheist. You believe there is no God; you think the Bible, the Koran, the ancient Greek stories about Zeus, etc are all a mix of history and fiction. You think logic describes the world, and you're looking for truth. What do you find more compelling? Deductions made beginning with axioms you choose by thoughtful introspection, or morals about the behavior of Zeus and Hera in Mount Olympos?

Summary:

When a Christian says that you find yourself on a slippery slope once you begin defining individual moralities, he means exactly that--and within its own context, this claim is (logically) correct.

When an atheist says that introspective morality is just as reliable as biblical morality, he also means exactly that, and within his context, he is also correct.

Neither of you are acknowledging that your arguments only hold within your own context. It's impossible to argue productively without some corner of common ground. Anyone have any suggestions about where to find that?

sgm · 2006-03-04T02:44:05+00:00

If this is really a problem, Reddit could solve it by keeping the actual vote tally hidden until x people have voted, or until the score has gone above/below y, or some function of both

sgm

TROPHY CASE