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Comment Re:People are IDIOTS (Score 1) 180

No, I think they may have a point, logos can affect you. Every time I see a Windows logo, after a while, I get this overwhelming urge to throw something at it

From Wikipedia: "The broken windows theory is a criminological theory that shows visible signs of crime, anti-social behavior, and civil disorder create an urban environment that encourages further crime and disorder, including serious crimes."

That certainly explains a lot.

Comment Re:They're still safer even with mistakes (Score 0) 353

Nuclear is the safest power source man has ever invented. Even with the disasters at Chernobyl and Fukushima, it has killed fewer people per TWh generated than any other power source.

What's going on is that people are really bad at appraising big but rare risks. Their mind focuses on the magnitude of the risk, exaggerating the larger risks. Simultaneously, their mind glosses over the lower frequency of the risk. Consequently, big, rare events like nuclear disasters get overemphasized in people's minds, while small, common events like maintenance workers falling from wind turbines get overlooked.

Comparisons rarely get more stupid than this. Events like Chernobyl and Fukushima impact not only the people who died as a direct consequence of the event (for example during or in the direct aftermath), but they have long lasting effects on the environment and the generations that follow those who worked and lived there. A maintenance worker falling from a wind turbine usually only impacts the ground directly beneath.

It's the same reason plane crashes are splashed over all the TV news, while car crashes rare make the news, even though going to a destination by car is 1-2 orders of magnitude more dangerous than going by plane. The magnitude of the carnage from a plane crash is greater and overwhelms our minds, while the much lower frequency of plane crashes is overlooked. Or on the flip side, it's why people spend money on lottery tickets even though on average they'll lose money. The magnitude of the payoff if you win overwhelms our mind, to where we completely ignore the infinitesimal odds of winning.

No, this has nothing whatsoever to do with assessing the risk of nuclear energy. A more apt comparison with plane crashes would be terrorist attacks.

Comment Re:We (usually) cannot diagnose melanoma on the sk (Score 1) 60

You are absolutely right of course on how proper and final diagnoses is established. The problem is, and your wife will probably agree, is that the initial diagnoses, you may even call it suspicion, is the most important because it determines whether follow-up tests will be conducted at all. My point is, actually two points are that 1) fewer first patient facing physicians (the front line if you will) will be taught and gain the experience to recognise melanomas (or the likelihood of it being one) in the first place and 2) automated testing will be more expensive in some health systems leading to diminished access to proper diagnoses and eventually treatment for many, thus exacerbating the original problem.

Technology is far more useful when it complements expertise and experience not when it merely replaces it.

Comment Conclusion (Score 3, Insightful) 60

The obvious conclusion is therefore not to train more doctors to correctly diagnose melanomas but to have them photograph parts of your body and submit the pictures to an IT system which will in turn deliver a diagnosis. While this may be beneficial for a health system in general (not necessarily the US, where the CNN diagnosis will of course be an order of magnitutde more expensive than traditional methods...) it may lead to less well trained physicians in front of the patient. Which may sound like technophobia is in fact happening, or rather has been happening for quite some time. Many orthopedic and trauma surgeons solely rely on imaging systems for diagnosis, while older clinicians or those trained in less advanced health systems could perform reliable first diagnosis with conventional means. You can stilll witness this in parts of Germany with physicians trained in the GDR.

In theory, modern technology should supplement experience when in fact it far too often replaces it, increasing the overall financial burden to the system.

Comment Economics And Power (Score 1) 522

If Amazon is willing to relocate or not grow a business that already employs 40.000 people in the local economy just to avoid 10.000.000 USD in taxes annually, I would say let them. Who needs an asshole company like this? I know it's currently en vogue in the US, or at least for a lot of people, to piss on anything remotely related to social responsibility, but if your economy is dependent on businesses ripping off the state and the people, it's fucked anyway.

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