HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy)
Subject: Re: ZERO Nuclear impact (was: Is car pooling for real? etc)
Reply-To: jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU
Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University
	<50892@dime.cs.umass.edu> <1992Jul26.034127.12027@nmt.edu>
Date: 26 Jul 92 22:25:19

I should have stated that what Nader was fearing was microwave burns,
i.e. where the user gets cooked by the microwaves plus crediting
a vague notion that the 5 microwatts that is allowed to get out
would do something bad, like give children leukemia.  The former
hasn't happened as far as I know.  The latter has faded out
as a hazard, but it's not the kind of thing that can be
definitely refuted short of exposing a few million children
to measured doses.

Like anything else that produces heat, a microwave can cause
burns by heating up food that subsequently burns someone.
However, the odds are better than with something that involves
an open flame or a stove that remains hot long after the food
is cooked.

There is also the possibility of causing a fire inside the over
by leaving a metal wire.  These fires are almost always confined
to the inside of the microwave.

Therefore, I reiterate my opinion that Nader killed quite a few
children who would have been saved had their parents not been
convinced not to buy microwave ovens.  An estimate could be made if
you are willing to ascribe to Nader some fraction the slower
penetration of microwave ovens in the American market as compared to
the Japanese market.  You would also have to look at some more
detailed statistics about deaths and injuries from burns than are
given in the Statistical Abstract of the United States.

I suppose this won't satisfy Victor Yodaiken, but I am unable
to bring to my usenet postings the standards of publication in
scientific journals.  I try to do as well as the average journalist,
however.

--
John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
*
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
From: dean@vexcel.com (dean alaska)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Electricity Efficiency
Date: 28 Jul 92 22:11:16 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: VEXCEL Corporation, Boulder, CO

In article <STEINLY.92Jul28133550@topaz.ucsc.edu> steinly@topaz.ucsc.edu (Steinn Sigurdsson) writes:
>In article <1992Jul28.145134.1429@vexcel.com> dean@vexcel.com (dean alaska) writes:
>
>   The facts I have quoted indicate otherwise.  Ongoing DSM projects 
>   already have the capacity to "retrieve" energy on this scale: "This
>   DSM will provide a reduction of 45 GW ... in 2000, and a potential
>   capital savings of up to $45 billion." from the EPRI report.  This quote
>
>Does this refer to actual saving, or saving relative to projected
>demand? Big difference.

The numbers refer to "reductions in peak summer demand." 
Since these numbers are absolute figures rather than percentages, they
are not "relative".  If projected demand is lower than expected, then
I imagine the savings would also be.  Ditto if demand was above
projections.  Is this the point you are trying to make?  In any case,
these numbers represent the status quo.  Clearly, much larger savings
are possible with a concerted effort.
>
>*  Steinn Sigurdsson   			Lick Observatory      	*
>* steinly@helios.ucsc.edu		"standard disclaimer"  	*
>*  Some people think they're really clever			*
>*  Smash your head against the wall            Specials, 1979	* 


-- 

		dingo in boulder	(dean@vexcel.com)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: cdm@pmafire.inel.gov (Dale Cook)
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 92 23:15:38 GMT
Organization: WINCO
Subject: Re: Demonstration Forests
Summary: 
Followup-To: 
Organization: WINCO
Keywords: Stop the Orygun Chainsaw Massacre, etc, etc.

In article <40448@ogicse.ogi.edu> jhurst@amb4.ese.ogi.edu (James Hurst) writes:
>Regeneration on hostile sites is tough after you clearcut:  when the soil temp
>goes above 90 degrees, seedlings begin to die.  If the soil fauna is so damaged
>that the seedlings can't link up with fungal symbiotes, they usually die of 
>drought the first year (just another reason to RISE UP FOR MYCORRHIZAE!  8^).
>At altitude, full exposure to UV sometimes bakes them, and midsummer frosts
>take out more.

At this altitude, the clearcuts in the Targhee are having a _very_ tough
go of it.  There are areas logged over 10 years ago, and what replanted
trees have survived are scrawny twisted little things.  The area was 
heavy hit by pine beetles and was sold off as salvage timber sales.  What
I find interesting is that in the areas that have not been logged, even
though there's a lot of dead snags, the young trees are doing much better
than in the clearcut areas.  In some ways, this part of the country is
a very hostile site: high altitude, low rainfall/droughts, bitter winters,
and not the greatest of soils.  Plus, you can expect a frost most anytime
at 6500+ ft.  It'll be interesting indeed to compare how Yellowstone
regens over the next few years as compared to the clearcut areas which
in many cases march right up to the park boundary.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
...Dale Cook    "The best thing about rainforests is they never suffer
                   from drought."  ---VP Dan Quayle
The opinions are mine only (i.e., they are NOT my employer's)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Letters to the Editor:  Blazing Ta
Date: 24 Jul 92 10:27:41 GMT
Organization: LLNL
Originator: lip@s1.gov


In article <JMC.92Jul23224323@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>, jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy) writes:
#- In spite of all the errors in Blazing Tattles, the promoters of these
#- stories still have a pretty good chance of saving Saddam Hussein's
#- ballistic missile and nuclear weapons programs.

	How does that follow?

/Loren
From: smith@ctron.com (Larry Smith)
Newsgroups: sci.environment,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Cost of public vs. private transportation
Date: 24 Jul 92 13:51:03 GMT
Reply-To: smith@ctron.com
Followup-To: sci.environment
Organization: Cabletron Systems, Inc.

In article <1992Jul23.095805.11661@dxcern.cern.ch>, jake@dxal13.cern.ch (Robert Jacobsen) writes:

>|>	$26.9 billion in subsidies.

>|>The subsidies are all sums whose sources are something other than user
>|>fees -- income taxes, sales taxes, property taxes, bond-issue
>|>proceeds, etc.

Income tax from GM, Ford, Chrysler?  Income tax from car dealers, mechanics,
Exxon, gas station owner? Income tax from steelworkers and tire manufacturers?
Sales taxes from cars, gasoline, spare parts, repair labor?  Property taxes on
cars, gas stations, assembly plants?

It has often been noted that more than a quarter of our economy is directly
dependent on cars, I find it quite plausible that $26.9 billion could come
from all of the above sources, and more.  More that is pure profit, taken
from cars and spent on causes dear to the hearts of social engineers.

>Unfortunately, the argument requires that ALL highway user-fees go just to
>highway maintenence and construction.  The accounting becomes complex when
>highway fees pay for mass transit, and mass transit fees pay for highways

Not to mention the vastly inflated costs in highway maintenance due to greatly
increased truck weights.  The thicker paving needed today, the higher propor-
tion of reinforcing materials, the higher grades of steel, the extensive
switch from reinforced concrete to pure steel in bridges, all due to higher
truck weights.  Subtract out these inflated requirements, and add the amount
that goes to mass transit from gas taxes, and I think it become obvious to
anybody but Michael Vandemann that cars turn a handsome profit for the gov't
taxman.

Larry Smith (smith@ctron.com) No, I don't speak for Cabletron.
-------------------------------------------------------------
Daily I'd go over to Congress - that grand old benevolent national asylum - and
report on the inmates there.  Never seen a body of men with tongues more handy,
or information more uncertain.  If one of those men had been present when the
Deity was on the point of saying "Let there be light" we never would've had it.
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: cdm@pmafire.inel.gov (Dale Cook)
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 92 17:51:22 GMT
Organization: WINCO
Subject: Re: Interstate Freeway System (was: Cost of public vs. ...) 
Summary: 
Followup-To: 
Organization: WINCO
Keywords: 

In article <=mR-8C#@engin.umich.edu> blagdon@engin.umich.edu (Kenneth James Clark ) writes:
>In article <1992Jul22.135049.25666@pmafire.inel.gov> cdm@pmafire.inel.gov (Dale Cook) writes:
>>
>>As I recall (sorry, no references), part of the justification for the 
>>interstate freeway system was military:  to facilitate the rapid 
>>deployment of troops anywhere in the country.  That would partially
>>justify the expenditure of general funds to build it.
>>
>
>As I recall, that was the *main* justification.  Of course, General Dynamics,
>a division of GM, builds the nation's tanks.  The highways were built
>after a major world war and during the cold war, when we were afraid of
>being invaded (Is anyone still afraid of the threat of invasion?).  Has
>the military ever used the Highway System to move large amounts of 
>personnel and equipment large distances?  Maybe this is part of 
>Eisenhower's "Military-Industrial Complex" bogeyman.
>
>I like Carl's idea.  Make them all toll-roads.  If you wish, tanks ride
>free :-)  (Oh yeah, and part of the military budget goes toward the roads.)
>
So do I.  I was not trying to defend the military justification for 
building the interstate, only to provide background context for the
use of general funds to build it, given the "need".  Whether or not
the need is/was legitimate is a completely different argument.

BTW, if we make the interstates (or other roads, for that matter), toll
roads, I think gas taxes ought to be revisited as well.  Like, eliminate
that portion of the taxes currently designated for road maintenance and
force each road to be repaired _solely_ from toll revenue.  Of course,
Uncle Sam won't like that because he loses a budget balancing asset.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
...Dale Cook    "Verbosity leads to unclear, inarticulate things."
                   ---  VP Dan Quayle
The opinions are mine only (i.e., they are NOT my employer's)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: dean@vexcel.com (dean alaska)
Subject: Re: Electricity Efficiency
Organization: VEXCEL Corporation, Boulder, CO
Distribution: usa
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1992 18:13:40 GMT

In article <JMC.92Jul28105328@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU writes:
>In article <1992Jul28.145630.1530@vexcel.com> dean@vexcel.com (dean alaska) writes:
>
>I believe falsified x-ray inspections can be raised at any time.
>What you won't be able to do is start a whole new appeal on the
>need for the plant in the first place.

This was not my impression although I haven't read the clauses relating
to it in the energy bill.  Does anyone know what the appeals process is
for safety/design related issues for the specific plant with the 1-step
process?
>
>--
>John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
>*
>He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
>


-- 

		dingo in boulder	(dean@vexcel.com)
Newsgroups: sci.environment,sci.physics,sci.energy
From: lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich)
Subject: Re: Is car pooling for real? (was Re: Are bikes really less polluting?)
Organization: LLNL
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 14:43:27 GMT

In article <1992Jul25.165443.12855@ke4zv.uucp> gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman) writes:
>In article <1992Jul24.104318.29346@s1.gov> lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich) writes:
>>
>>In article <1992Jul24.042149.5038@ke4zv.uucp>, gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman) writes:
>>:In article <1992Jul23.004537.4803@s1.gov> lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich) writes:
::
::	[muggings, murders, etc. on mass-transit systems...]
::
::	But there are serious crimes associated specifically with cars:
::
::	Car theft.
::
::	And car-stereo theft.
:
:
:Well, you can take steps to reduce issues of car theft and property
:theft by intalling an alarm system or buying insurance against property
:loss. On mass transit it's illegal to carry effective weapons to deter
:aggression against your *person*. Hardly the same thing.

	Says who?

	I've never seen any "no guns or knives" signs on any of the
buses or rail systems I've ever used.

	Personally, I think that a bulletproof vest and a helmet would
be more worthwhile than a gun -- and it would make a good statement
:-)

	A gun is not much use if the other guy stuck at one at you
first -- unless you are also wearing the above-described equipment.

	I guess this issue ought to be taken to talk.politics.guns.

Newsgroups: sci.environment,sci.energy
From: crb7q@kelvin.seas.Virginia.EDU (Cameron Randale Bass)
Subject: Re: What is Market Efficiency.  was Re: ZERO Nuclear impact (was: Is car pooling for real? etc)
Organization: University of Virginia
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1992 23:46:55 GMT

In article <1992Jul28.162141.25574@cco.caltech.edu> carl@SOL1.GPS.CALTECH.EDU writes:
>In article <1992Jul28.040142.3359@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU>, crb7q@kelvin.seas.Virginia.EDU (Cameron Randale Bass) writes:
>>>In many cases, the effect of a very free market is to make it less 
>>>efficient since there is more crap for the buyer to wade through to 
>>>determine the facts that lead to an efficient market.  (Higher search
>>>costs leading to a less effective search leading to a lower market 
>>>efficiency).
>>
>>     What is this?  Marxist econ 101?
>
>No, it's standard microeconomics.

    See my response to the other poster.  I'm tired of typing.

>>     Supposedly the market balances the incremental costs to wade
>>     through a number of competing products with the increased 
>>     possibility of a less expensive solution to whatever particular
>>     problem you have (say recurrent yeast infection).
>
>>     Have the definitions of market efficiency changed since I 
>>     went to school a decade ago?  If so, I like the old ones.  They
>>     don't seem to have as much sociological garbage thrown in.
>
>No, but perhaps your economics courses didn't delve as deeply into various
>market failures as they might have.  For example, does the term "marginal
>competition" mean anything to you?  The classic example is the ready-to-eat
>cereal market.  You've got, in most cases, at least three brands of cereal of
>any given type (in some cases, dozens of virtually indistinguishable cereals).
>The manufacturers take these virtually indistinguishable cereals and modify
>some unimportant aspect of it (e.g., the shapes of the marshmallow bits), then
>pour tremendous amounts of money into advertising campaigns to get you to buy
>their particular trivial variation on the theme.  That's a market inefficiency.

     Yes, that could be a canonical example.  However, we were discussing
     cigarettes (like it matters).

                                 dale bass
--
C. R. Bass                                           crb7q@virginia.edu
Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
University of Virginia
Charlottesville, Virginia                            (804) 924-7926
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: blagdon@engin.umich.edu (Kenneth James Clark )
Subject: Re: Cost of public vs. private transportation
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 92 11:18:36 EDT
Organization: University of Michigan Engineering, Ann Arbor

In article <1992Jul24.082656.6584@ke4zv.uucp> gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman) writes:
>That gives a new total of $138.05
>billion a year in government revenue from road vehicles. That more than
>covers a $71.2 billion expenditure for highways which is why they raid 
>the funds for mass transit subsidies. We haven't even mentioned tolls
>or special wheel taxes imposed on interstate trucks and local commuters.


Nor have you even mentioned the non-highway roads that make up most of
the road mileage in this country.

Ken
From: lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Cost of public vs. private transportation
Date: 24 Jul 92 21:22:19 GMT
Organization: LLNL

In article <4580@balrog.ctron.com> smith@ctron.com writes:
>In article <1992Jul23.095805.11661@dxcern.cern.ch>, jake@dxal13.cern.ch (Robert Jacobsen) writes:
:
::|:	$26.9 billion in subsidies.
:
::|:The subsidies are all sums whose sources are something other than user
::|:fees -- income taxes, sales taxes, property taxes, bond-issue
::|:proceeds, etc.
:
:Income tax from GM, Ford, Chrysler?  Income tax from car dealers, mechanics,
:Exxon, gas station owner? Income tax from steelworkers and tire manufacturers?
:Sales taxes from cars, gasoline, spare parts, repair labor?  Property taxes on
:cars, gas stations, assembly plants?

:It has often been noted that more than a quarter of our economy is directly
:dependent on cars, I find it quite plausible that $26.9 billion could come
:from all of the above sources, and more.  More that is pure profit, taken
:from cars and spent on causes dear to the hearts of social engineers.

	But what of the other 75%?

	And why this bashing of "social engineers"? Who are they? And
do they include the planners of highway systems?

::Unfortunately, the argument requires that ALL highway user-fees go just to
::highway maintenence and construction.  The accounting becomes complex when
::highway fees pay for mass transit, and mass transit fees pay for highways

:Not to mention the vastly inflated costs in highway maintenance due to greatly
:increased truck weights.  The thicker paving needed today, the higher propor-
:tion of reinforcing materials, the higher grades of steel, the extensive
:switch from reinforced concrete to pure steel in bridges, all due to higher
:truck weights.  Subtract out these inflated requirements, and add the amount
:that goes to mass transit from gas taxes, and I think it become obvious to
:anybody but Michael Vandemann that cars turn a handsome profit for the gov't
:taxman.

	The most that this chain of argument has demonstrated is that
car drivers are subsidizing truckers. If we could only get all those
trucks off the road...

	This is yet another good excuse for revitalizing America's
railroads; they could be used for even more of the long-distance
shipments than they are today. Some train cars are designed to carry
truck trailers and there is already a sizable business in carrying
truck trailers by train. Expanding this business would save a lot of
wear and tear on our intercity highways, though trucks would still be
neede for relatively local deliveries and deliveries to out-of-the-way
places.
Newsgroups: sci.environment,sci.physics
From: lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich)
Subject: Re: Cost of public vs. private transportation
Organization: LLNL
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1992 22:34:30 GMT

In article <22072@venera.isi.edu> finn@dalek.isi.edu (Greg Finn) writes:
>In article <1992Jul29.014145.20843@s1.gov> lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich) writes:
:
::	When doing the car calculations, was it assumed that one had
::now competition as one was traveling by car?

:	My understanding was that they were measured against same
:time-of-day trip times over a similar route.  No freeways then
:remember.  It seemed fair but I never read the study itself, just a
:two-page summary as reported.

	I guess one would have to look at the whole thing.

	And when I specified "no competition", I had in mind an
absence of other drivers. Traffic jams cause considerable slowdowns.

	And if one drives, one's time is occupied controlling the car,
while if one travels by public transit, or is driven by someone else,
one is free to do other things. Is _that_ ever figured?

::It would be interesting
::to compare the Red Line timetables to those one works out from
::traveling in present-day LA's parking-lot freeways.

:	To be fair you would need to compare against a mass transit
:system that carried the same volume of people.  Hard to do.

	Really?

	One can do this in several places.

	For example, in the Bay Area, one can compare commuting by
BART between Walnut Creek or Hayward or El Cerrito to San Francisco
and driving the distance. Going under the Bay by BART certainly beats
out fighting all the traffic on the Bay Bridge.

Newsgroups: sci.environment,sci.physics
From: lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich)
Subject: Re: Cost of public vs. private transportation
Organization: LLNL
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1992 00:49:41 GMT

In article <JMC.92Jul21114929@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU writes:
>I do arithmetic when I have the data.  In the case of BART costs
>all I have is a memory of newspaper and magazine articles some
>years back which I didn't save.

	I got a lot of my info from various BART publications, such as
a newsletter for employees; I also get info from actually using BART.

>He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.

	Same to you.

/Loren
From: govender@shannon.ee.wits.ac.za (Govender)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: ZERO Nuclear impact (was: Is car pooling for real? etc)
Date: 28 Jul 92 10:35:31 GMT
Organization: Electrical Engineering, University of the Witwatersrand

In <50981@dime.cs.umass.edu> yodaiken@chelm.cs.umass.edu (victor yodaiken) writes:

>In article <STEINLY.92Jul27164005@topaz.ucsc.edu> steinly@topaz.ucsc.edu (Steinn Sigurdsson) writes:
>>In article <50926@dime.cs.umass.edu> yodaiken@chelm.cs.umass.edu (victor yodaiken) writes:
>>
>>   I have no opinion on microwave ovens, but Prof. McCarthy has attempted to
>>   argue as follows:
>>	 A) Nader attempted to stop the use of microwave ovens
>>	 B) Burns from ordinary ovens are not unusual
>>	 C) No injuries at all are caused by microwave ovens
>>
>>You exaggerate Victor. The argument boiled down to: there is a known,

>I most certainly did not exaggerate here. 

>>finite injury rate for children from conventional ovens. Nader argued
>>that microwaves have a higher probability of injury, McCarthy
>>suggested the injury rate was in fact _lower_ - not zero.

>Sorry, but you are incorrect. Here are  Prof. McCarthy's very words:

>In article <JMC.92Jul25195926@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU writes:
>>   >I dunno about Greenpeace, but Ralph Nader did try to ban microwave
>>   >ovens for that reason.  If Nader is responsible for the slower
>>   >penetration of microwave ovens in the U.S. as compared to Japan,
>>   >he killed a lot of children.  No-one has been injured by a microwave
>>   >oven, but the conventional cooking that might have been displaced
>>   >partly by microwave cooking has proabably killed a few hundred
>>

>Please note: "No-one has been injured by a microwave oven". 

it seems that this argument boils down to: what does the phrase "injured by 
a microwave oven" mean ? (shades of wittgenstein 8-)). microwave ovens may 
fall on your head;you may close a microwave oven door on your fingers;you 
may drink milk which scalds your tongue - these are all injuries

the problem is all these injuries are caused by someone's stupidity and/or
carelessness         
 and not through the consequences of using a microwave oven with
a reasonable amount of care.i feed my 9 month old child on milk heated in
a microwave oven.i also make damn sure that either my wife or i have sampled
 the milk before it is shoved down the baby's throat.                                                                            

imho childproofing conventional electrical and gas cooking equipment is far
more difficult if not impossible compared to a microwave oven which imho
is childproof.

morgan govender
govender@shannon.ee.wits.ac.za
Newsgroups: sci.environment,sci.physics,sci.energy