New, just released ocean temperature data has shown a dramatic increase in temperatures in the Northern Pacific, and a dramatic decrease in surface temperatures in the Northern Atlantic. As I understand it, those readings are not consistent with normal 'El Nino' patterns. Could this be the beginning of the end of thermohaline circulation? If that happens we'll be facing unavoidable, unpredictable, worldwide, disastrous climate change in short order.
Without the current created by the thermohaline circulations, the oceans die. Equatorial waters become much hotter...fast...and arctic and Antarctic waters become much colder...fast. Ocean organisms can't live through that kind of change, not in any sizeable way anyway. Without the oceans, the entire food web dissolves and we die.
On top of that, without the currents bringing oxygen to the lower oceans, they become anoxic. The bacteria that live in those deep waters will feed on the dead sea life and create toxic gases (hydrogen sulfide) which have, in the past, completed the extinction events by wiping out nearly all life. Once that starts, it's unstoppable and is the end. Let's hope these readings are just an over active El Nino.

What we do today has little to no effect for 50-100 years. That makes us at least 50 years too late to solve this problem, and we are still exacerbating it rather than solving it to this day.
We're hosed.
If you plan on having children in this climate, you are a child abuser IMO, and are adding to the problem with that one action more than almost any other action normal people perform. Your children will most likely not survive to old age, and absolutely won't experience the same quality of life you have.

South Park Fact: The show is made in Southern California, so a power outage in Colorado would have no effect on production.

NC's collection of interesting links yesterday brought us this paper by the Bank of England.

The summary upfront is somewhat interesting, the rest gives you cancer.

But here's something, page 3/61, second paragraph:

Furthermore, if the loan is for physical investment purposes, this new lending and money is what triggers investment and therefore, by the national accounts identity of saving and investment (for closed economies), saving. Saving is therefore a consequence, not a cause, of such lending. Saving does not finance investment, financing does. To argue otherwise confuses the respective macroeconomic roles of resources (saving) and debt-based money (financing).

Unless my brain truly did take same damage from reading the first ten pages of the paper, this paragraph is basically saying that the mainstream theory of crowding out is a load of shit. It's probably just a minority position within the BoE, but still...

The last paragraph of the summary also states that reserve positions have little to no effect on a bank's ability and willingness to lend. Any claims that a shortage of savings is responsible for a lack of credit are thrown out of the window right then and there. It's a lack of credit-worthy customers, end of story.

The BoE folks responsible for this paper still don't go all the way, but these two issues alone are devastating enough to mainstream economics and the policies that result from it.

UGH! I tried that once. I got a tongue covered in kiwi fur/hairs. I'm not falling for that again! ;-)
Really, we split them then dehydrate them. They last way longer that way (although keeping a kiwi isn't a problem, they don't ripen until you put them in a bag with an apple...I've kept ripe ones on the vine for months with no effect.). It also shrinks them by over 1/2.

Because it's the decent thing to do. Giving another group a right that you have has no effect on you at all. You aren't being oppressed by them gaining rights and it takes no more effort for society to allow them these rights.

The question is better put 'why should society treat a minority group differently to the majority of the population?'

Hey robbersdog49, thanks for the level headed reply. I'll address your comments in a few pieces here:

The origin of life and Darwinian evolution are two entirely different things. Regardless of how you believe the first life came about we do know from the fossil record and evidence about the way the environment and climate changed on earth in those early millennia that the first life was simple single cell organisms.

In my study of the evidence from the fossil record, I found more evidence that contradicted the assertions of Darwinian evolution than confirmed it. The Cambrian explosion for example, where basically every type of animal body plan comes into existence at around the same time, contradicts the idea that these things happened gradually over long periods of time. In fact, a new theory was invented called "punctuated equilibrium" which says that the reason we aren't finding the transitional fossils is that the changes happen too quickly to be found in the fossil record. Instead of a theory based on the evidence, we have a theory to explain away the lack of evidence.

Evolution is the process which turned these very simple life forms into the complex forms you see all around you today. It's an ongoing process and the evidence for evolution is overwhelming.

The evidence for micro evolution is overwhelming. The reason we have hundreds of different breeds of dogs is because of micro evolution. Darwin discovered this and all the credit should go to him, but where the leap of faith took place was when he supposed that because we see changes within species, that therefore all life evolved from a common ancestor. This claim is not substantiated scientifically. You cannot see macro evolution taking place anywhere in the world, and you cannot find the transitional fossils to say it ever took place. You cannot test it in a laboratory, it is a historical claim based on weak circumstantial evidence.

Science doesn't know exactly how life first came about. It doesn't claim to. We know that it did because we're here, but how? Not sure. But that's not a problem, science doesn't claim to know everything. Science is a process we use to find out about the world around us. It's not a book with all the answers.

Science is all about what we don't know. It's a process of discovery, and you can't discover something you already know. Religious people like to show any gap in the knowledge of scientists as showing they are frauds, or know nothing and that this means their own views must be true. That's just a stupid logical fallacy. Just because no one else has the answer doesn't mean you can just claim your version must be correct.

Science not being able to tell us how life started has no effect on the validity of the statement 'God did it'.

The God of the gaps fallacy is simply a red herring in these conversations. I don't purport to say that because science can't explain something, that means God did it. Science is all about the principle of parsimony; what theory has the best explanatory power. I purport to say that the idea of a Creator has better explanatory power for what we see than the current scientific theories for origins, not because of what science cannot explain, but for what science has explained. I think the evidence we do understand, in physics, biology, cosmology and information theory overwhelmingly points to design for many good reasons that have nothing to do with the God of the gaps fallacy.

There is also it seems a point of pride for those who think the best position is to say "I don't know", and accusing anyone who thinks they do know as being wrong headed, arrogant, or whatever. It's a very curious position to take because there are plenty of things we can know. No one is going to take the position that if you say the answer to 2 + 2 is 4 and you deny that any other answer is valid, you are arrogant or using fallacious reasoning. Yet, it is arrogrant and fallacious to those who think that science is the sole arbitor of truth when someone who believes in God points to a Creator as the best explanation. They think that because they believe no one else could know the answer except through scientific discovery. You have to realize that is a faith based claim and not an evidence based claim. You think that way when you place your faith in science as what is going to give you the correct answers about how and why you are here. I like these quotes for Robert Jastrow, who was an Astronomer and physicist:

"For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountain of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries."

"Scientists have no proof that life was not the result of an act of creation, but they are driven by the nature of their profession to seek explanations for the origin of life that lie within the boundaries of natural law."

As for the age of the earth, there's a huge amount of evidence which says it's about 4.54 ± 0.05 billion years old. That's plenty of time for evolution to take us from simple single cell life to the complex animals we've become today.

Have you ever studied the scientific proofs for both sides? There are some "clocks" which point that way, and there are other clocks that point the other way. The clocks that point to the old Earth have many flaws, and there are simply more evidences that point to a young Earth. That video I provided shows the evidences I am talking about.

The origin of life and Darwinian evolution are two entirely different things. Regardless of how you believe the first life came about we do know from the fossil record and evidence about the way the environment and climate changed on earth in those early millennia that the first life was simple single cell organisms.

Evolution is the process which turned these very simple life forms into the complex forms you see all around you today. It's an ongoing process and the evidence for evolution is overwhelming.

Science doesn't know exactly how life first came about. It doesn't claim to. We know that it did because we're here, but how? Not sure. But that's not a problem, science doesn't claim to know everything. Science is a process we use to find out about the world around us. It's not a book with all the answers.

Science is all about what we don't know. It's a process of discovery, and you can't discover something you already know. Religious people like to show any gap in the knowledge of scientists as showing they are frauds, or know nothing and that this means their own views must be true. That's just a stupid logical fallacy. Just because no one else has the answer doesn't mean you can just claim your version must be correct.

Science not being able to tell us how life started has no effect on the validity of the statement 'God did it'.

As for the age of the earth, there's a huge amount of evidence which says it's about 4.54 ± 0.05 billion years old. That's plenty of time for evolution to take us from simple single cell life to the complex animals we've become today.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_the_Earth

And thus are we stuck between a rock and a hard place. The politician wants you to believe that if we DO contribute to global warming (and we do) then it has to be to a degree that requires huge change and therefore huge amounts of cash. The monolithic oil/fuel companies want you to believe that we have no effect whatsoever, please continue burning as many fossils as you can find.

And the field of science (put simply, the desire of the most inquisitive amongst us to better understand the reality we find ourselves in) stuck in the middle quietly cataloging and recording exactly what is happening with the highest precision available, being completely fucking ignored.

But that is the way of Earth and i've made my peace with it. Suicide through capitalism, we are more interested in presentation than content, personal gain than collective gain, and afterall what is more presentable than the easy option? But i consider this a failing on the part of scientists to insist how important it is that we make our collective decisions based on our best understanding (i.e. science). I would like to correct that mistake, but i don't know how yet. I figure it will have to involve being able to present scientific ideas well, and VS has helped me hone that skill.

In other words thanks very much @enoch, i just wish he'd engage me. (I was less than polite because i know he ignores me - he doesn't want to learn, he wants to win.)

It would follow, therefore, that everyone would choose their religion according to their own temperament and there would be no regional grouping of belief.

Would you say, for example, that catholicism in ireland has had no effect on its prevailing culture and no part in the various atrocities that culture has inflicted on the people unfortunate enough to be born into it?

Islam is particularly poorly placed to distance itself from the actions of its adherents. It's a common, but not really excusable, error to generalise from christianity's 'contradictory mess' and necessity of invention in interpretation to what in reality is islam's lamentably direct instructions to its followers.

The difference between countries like turkey and saudi arabia, though turkey's hardly a shining beacon of freedom, is secularity and proximity to more enlightened neighbours. Arguing that some muslims are like this and some muslims are like that is preposterously mendacious when the mean truth is: the less religious people are, the more ethical they are.

Not entirely cut and dry.
+ Gun suicide fell
+ Mass shootings fell.
- Gun homicide in general didn't fall

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Australia#Measuring_the_effects_of_firearms_laws_in_Australia

"Some researchers have found a significant change in the rate of firearm suicides after the legislative changes. For example, Ozanne-Smith et al. (2004)[33] in the journal Injury Prevention found a reduction in firearm suicides in Victoria, however this study did not consider non-firearm suicide rates. Others have argued that alternative methods of suicide have been substituted. De Leo, Dwyer, Firman & Neulinger,[34] studied suicide methods in men from 1979 to 1998 and found a rise in hanging suicides that started slightly before the fall in gun suicides. As hanging suicides rose at about the same rate as gun suicides fell, it is possible that there was some substitution of suicide methods. It has been noted that drawing strong conclusions about possible impacts of gun laws on suicides is challenging, because a number of suicide prevention programs were implemented from the mid-1990s onwards, and non-firearm suicides also began falling.[35]

In 2005 the head of the New South Wales Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research, Don Weatherburn,[36] noted that the level of legal gun ownership in New South Wales increased in recent years, and that the 1996 legislation had had little to no effect on violence. Professor Simon Chapman, former co-convenor of the Coalition for Gun Control, complained that his words "will henceforth be cited by every gun-lusting lobby group throughout the world in their perverse efforts to stall reforms that could save thousands of lives".[37] Weatherburn responded, "The fact is that the introduction of those laws did not result in any acceleration of the downward trend in gun homicide. They may have reduced the risk of mass shootings but we cannot be sure because no one has done the rigorous statistical work required to verify this possibility. It is always unpleasant to acknowledge facts that are inconsistent with your own point of view. But I thought that was what distinguished science from popular prejudice."[38]"

-scheherazade

You seem to think that eliminating guns will somehow eliminate mass shootings. However, there is zero correlation to the number of legal gun ownerships with the number of homicides. In fact, here are some statistics for you:

At present, a little more than half of all Americans own the sum total of about 320 million guns, 36% of which are handguns, but fewer than 100,000 of these guns are used in violent crimes. And, as it happens, where gun ownership per capita increases, violent crime is known to decrease. In other words, Caucasians tend to own more guns than African Americans, middle aged folks own more guns than young people, wealthy people own more guns than poor people, rural families own more guns than urbanites --> But the exact opposite is true for violent behavior (i.e., African Americans tend to be more violent than Caucasians, young people more violent than middle aged people, poor people more violent than wealthy people, and urbanites more violent than rural people). So gun ownership tends increase where violence is the least. This is, in large part, due to the cultural divide in the U.S. around gun ownership whereby most gun owners own guns for recreational sports (including the Southern Caucasian rural hunting culture, the likes of which aren't found in Australia or the UK or Europe, etc.); and about half of gun owners own guns for self-defense (usually as the result of living in a dangerous environment). Most of the widespread gun ownership in the U.S. predates any gun control legislation and gun ownership tends to generally rise as a response to an increase in violent crime (not the other way around).

There were about 350,000 crimes in 2009 in which a gun was present (but may not have been used), 24% of robberies, 5% of assaults, and about 66% of homicides. By contrast, guns are used as self-defense as many as 2 and a half million times every year (according to criminologist Gary Kleck at Florida State University), thereby decreasing the potential loss of life or property (i.e., those with guns are less likely to be injured in a violent crime than those who use another defensive strategy or simply comply).

Interestingly, violent crimes tend to decrease in those areas where there have been highly publicized instances of victims arming themselves or defending themselves against violent criminals. (In the UK, where guns are virtually banned, 43% of home burglaries occur when people are in the home, whereas only 9% of home burglaries in the U.S. occur when people are in the home, presumably as a result of criminals' fear of being shot by the homeowner.) In short, gun ownership reduces the likelihood of harm.

So, for example, Boston has the strictest gun control and the most school shootings. The federal ban on assault weapons from '94-'04 did not impact amount and severity of school shootings. The worst mass homicide in a school in the U.S. took place in Michigan in 1927, killing 38 children. The perpetrator used (illegal) bombs, not guns in this case.

1/3 of legal gun owners obtain their guns (a total of about 200,000 guns) privately, outside the reach of government regulation. So, it's likely that gun-related crimes will increase if the general population is unarmed.

Out of a sample of 943 felon handgun owners, 44% had obtained the gun privately, 32% stole it, 9% rented/borrowed it, and 16% bought it from a retailer. (Note retail gun sales is the only area that gun control legislation can affect, since existing laws have failed to control for illegal activity. Stricter legislation would likely therefore change the statistics of how felon handgun owners obtain the gun towards less legal, more violent ways.) Less than 3% obtain guns on the 'black market' (probably due, in part, to how many legal guns are already easily obtained).

600,000 guns are stolen every year and millions of guns circulate among criminals (outside the reach of the regulators), so the elimination of all new handgun purchases/sales, the guns would still be in the hands of the criminals (and few others).

The common gun controls have been shown to have no effect on the reduction of violent crime, however, according to the Dept. of Justice, states with right-to-carry laws have a 30% lower homicide rate and a 46% lower robbery rate. A 2003 CDC report found no conclusive evidence that gun control laws reduced gun violence. This conclusion was echoed in an exhaustive National Academy of Sciences study a year later.

General gun ownership has no net positive effect on total violence rates.

Of almost 200,000 CCP holders in Florida, only 8 were revoked as a result of a crime.

The high-water mark of mass killings in the U.S. was back in 1929, and has not increased since then. In fact, it's declined from 42 incidents in 1990 to 26 from 2000-2012. Until recently, the worst school shootings took place in the UK or Germany. The murder rate and violent crime in the U.S. is less than half of what it was in the late 1980s (the reason for which is most certainly multimodal and multifaceted).

Regarding Gun-Free Zones, many mass shooters select their venues because there are signs there explicitly banning concealed handguns (i.e., where the likelihood is higher that interference will be minimal). "With just one single exception, the attack on congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in Tuscon in 2011, every public shooting since at least 1950 in the U.S. in which more than three people have been killed has taken place where citizens are not allowed to carry guns," says John Lott.

In any case, do we have any evidence to believe that the regulators (presumably the police in this instance) will be competent, honest, righteous, just, and moral enough to take away the guns from private citizens, when a study has shown that private owners are convicted of firearms violations at the same rate as police officers? How will you enforce the regulation and/or remove the guns from those who resist turning over their guns? Do the police not need guns to get those with the guns to turn over their guns? Does this then not presume that "gun control" is essentially an aim for only the government (i.e., the centralized political elite and their minions) to have guns at the exclusion of everyone else? Is the government so reliable, honest, moral, virtuous, and forward thinking as to ensure that the intentions of gun control legislation go exactly as planned?

From a sociological perspective, it's interesting to note that those in favor of gun control tend to live in relatively safe and wealthy neighborhoods where the danger posed by violent crime is far less than in those neighborhoods where gun ownership is believed to be more acceptable if not necessary. Do they really want to deprive those who are culturally acclimatized to gun-ownership, who may be less fortunate than they are, to have the means to protect themselves (e.g., women who carry guns to protect themselves from assault or rape)? Sounds more like a lack of empathy and understanding of those realities to me.

There are many generational issues worth mentioning here. For example, the rise in gun ownership coincided with the war on drugs and the war on poverty. There are also nearly 24 million combat veterans living in the U.S. and they constitute a significant proportion of the U.S.' prison population as a result of sex offenses or violent crime. Male combat veterans are four times as likely to engage violent crime as non-veteran men; and are 4.4 times more likely to have abused a spouse/partner, and 6.4 times more likely to suffer from PTSD, and 2-3 times more likely to suffer from depression, substance abuse, unemployment, divorce/separation. Vietnam veterans with PTSD tend to have higher rates of childhood abuse (26%) than Vietnam veterans without PTSD (7%). Iraq/Afghanistan vets are 75% more likely to die in car crashes. Sex crimes by active duty soldiers have tripled since 2003. In 2007, 700,000 U.S. children had at least one parent in a warzone. In a July 2010 report, child abuse in Army families was 3 times higher if a parent was deployed in combat. From 2001 - 2011, alcohol use associated with domestic violence in Army families increased by 54%, and child abuse increased by 40%. What effect do you think that's going to have, regardless of "gun controls?"
("The War Comes Home" or as William Golding, the author of Lord of the Flies said, "A spear is a stick sharpened at both ends.")

In addition, families in the U.S. continue to break down. Single parent households have a high correlation to violence among children. In 1965, 93% of all American births were to married women. Today, 41% of all births are to unmarried women (a rate that rises to 53% for women under the age of 30). By age 30, 1/3 of American women have spent time as a single mother (a rate that is halved in European countries like France, Sweden, & Germany). Less than 9% of married couples are in poverty, but more than 40% of single-parent families are in poverty. Much of child poverty would be ameliorated if parents were marrying at 1970s rates. 85% of incarcerated youth grew up without fathers.

Since the implementation of the war on drugs, there's a drug arrest in the U.S. every 19 seconds, 82% of which were for possession alone (destroying homes and families in the process). The Dept. of Justice says that illegal drug market in the U.S. is dominated by 900,000 criminally active gang members affiliated with 20,000 street gangs in more than 2,500 cities, many of which have direct ties to Mexican drug cartels in at least 230 American cities. The drug control spending, however, has grown by 69.7% over the past 9 years. The criminal justice system is so overburdened as a result that nearly four out of every ten murders, and six out of every ten rapes, and nine out of ten burglaries go unsolved (and 90% of the "solved" cases are the result of plea-bargains, resulting in non-definitive guilt). Only 8.5% of federal prisoners have committed violent offenses. 75% of Detroit's state budget can be traced back to the war on drugs.

Point being, a government program is unlikely to solve any issues with regards to guns and the whole notion of gun control legislation is severely misguided in light of all that I've pointed out above. In fact, a lot of the violence is the direct or indirect result of government programs (war on drugs and the war on poverty).

(And, you'll note, I made no mention of the recent spike in the polypharmacy medicating of a significant proportion of American children -- including most of the "school shooters" -- the combinations of which have not been studied, but have -- at least in part -- been correlated to homicidal and/or suicidal behaviors.)

Absolutely correct. Well put.

http://videosift.com/video/End-3-billion-a-year-aid-to-Israel

Using precision guided missiles and mortars to kill innocent children playing on the beach.

http://videosift.com/video/Israel-bombs-and-kills-kids-on-beach-NBC-fires-reporter

News reports obsess over the number of rockets fired from Gaza, comparing them to Israel's missile response. Never mentioning that Israel's missiles destroy entire city blocks and whole families whilst Gaza rockets (fireworks) have had nearly no effect on Israel whatsoever,
The hypocrisy of stating Israel is under attack, yet it's safe to holiday there, there has been nearly no impact from rockets whatsoever, and how dare any airline stop flights, is stunning.
The numbers speak for themselves. Gazan death toll is over 1000, 80% civilian. Israel is 30-ish, and that is 90% soldiers due to their ground invasion.

So...you admit to intentionally and improperly changing the embed codes "artistically", but can't fathom why you were stripped of that power? Think about that.
The admins 'hobbled the problem person here', yet they have no balls? What does that make the 'problem person' then, if they are so powerless against the ball-less?
I'm sure you'll blame this hobbling on me...even though I had nothing to do with it whatsoever. I only call you out on your constant vulgarity and attack posts, and otherwise do my best to ignore you.
Can you guess my vote? I bet not.
As an aside to all those that voted for "Reinstate powers after a period of time-out", how would you vote if the user in question has been banned, hobbled, and put on 'double secret probation' repeatedly for inappropriate behavior on the site? Would it change your vote, knowing that temporary 'time out's' had been tried repeatedly with little or no effect? How many 'time out's', bans, and hobbles should a single user get before a permanent I.P. hammer ban is reasonable? 3 strikes and you're out?

Whether he had one or not is irrelevant. The studies that were done on those who actually did have them later in life showed that it usually had either no effect on sex or actually improved it unless complications developed from the procedure (see the American Academy of Pediatrics 2012 Technical Report on Circumcision).

The benefits of newborn circumcisions are well-documented at this point (see for example the Mayo clinic's most recent report on the topic.) We know it also can reduce the risk of HIV infection in at risk populations.

Basically, if it does no harm and can actually have benefits, it's a valid medical procedure regardless of whether parents are choosing to do it for religious reasons or not.

Of course, should future research actually prove the risks outweigh the benefits then it should be stopped. We need to base these decisions on the medical evidence and not on our cultural prejudices.

Probably not very well. But that's not what I'm saying. There will not be a society without "leadership of any kind." Just not a state.

Obviously "people taking power for themselves" will need to be addressed in the absence of rulers. Otherwise, yes, it will happen, as we can see with how all states have developed like this: through such violence.

When there is no effective way to deal with those who are the most violent, then those who are the most violent will form a state to rule the rest.