While certain it is likely that - as other commenters note - above ground lines are more prone to failure, I would like to point out another possible factor: the structure of the network itself. Certain network structures which have more redundency in links between nodes are more robust, so that a failure of one line would result in less damage. Conversely, certain places might be located in particularly vulnurable sections of the network (for example, areas serviced by a single line as opposed to several).

I agree whole heartedly. Here is a recent, rigorous and relevant paper advocating a non-naive precautionary principle (much like you are): http://www.fooledbyrandomness....

First of all, the phrasing can very well refer to cladel trends (this is how I would interpret it in a technical text), in which case it kinda makes sense (while being admittadly somewhat ambiguous) to speak of Dinosaurs shrinking. Second of all, I resent the implicit conflation of evolution with natural selection espoused by your last sentence. Yes, this is evolution. No, this does not automatically mean every phenomenon is explained by selection (despite what adaptationists try to sell you).

I completely agree; we need sane preventitive health measures to become a priority. It is well known that this is also where the most is to be gained. However - antibiotics are still nice to have for those very extreme and nasty cases. I just hope we start learning to use them only when they are really needed.

It depends what you mean by Lamarckian evolution.

Lamarck's theory of evolution was teleological and argued that evolution tended towards complexity in a deterministic way. His inclusion of Soft Inheritance - inheritance of characteristics acquired during the lifetime of the organism - was peripheral and placed in order to explain adaptation of organisms to the environment. What was later called (perhaps misleadingly) (Neo)-Lamarckianism argued that most of the evolutionary phenomenology is best explained by a process where soft inheritance is predominant in frequency or even exclusive.

Now - the discovery of epigenetic mechanisms of soft inheritance has demonstrated a mechanism by which soft inheritance occurs but does not vindicate the theory that soft inheritance is significant in the evolutionary process. But I would not dismiss this type of inheritance as insignificant just because it is not altering the genetic sequence inside the chromosome; cultural inheritance of language is not genetic but is significant in humans.

Note the mistake Impy the Impiuos Imp made in assigning a specific genetic mechanism to Lamarckianism; the mechanisms of inheritance were not known when Lamarckianism was formulated, and when in the first half of the 20th century Mendel's work was rediscovered and genetic theory began to develop support for Lamarckian theories dropped. Few if any would support a contention that Lamarckian forces dominate evolution, but now we have mechanistic support for the idea that soft inheritance does play some role in evolution along with other forces.

Oh so Popper's Falsificationism is the be-all and end-all of what constitutes science? I guess I was mistaken when I thought there is far more subtlety and detail in the philosophy of science.....

...... and I am happy its finally being acknowledged and tackled more openly.

the Abstract:

YES both biological and financial systems involve trade-off and evolutionary dynamics. NO those are still not necessarily good analogues for one another......

THAT'S RIGHT! Because the Popperian criterion for demarcation is the only criterion - its completely infallible - and nobody has done any work on the philosophy of science in the last century except for Popper.

..... might be beneficial here - we can see technological evolution as something related to sociocultural evolution (the evolution of socially transmittable behaviors). The industrial revolution creating machines which produce copies of another artifact or even tool. Ours is a Technological and SocioCultural as well as Genetic Ecosystem with interdependency, and slowly we approach the point where some machines reproduce themselves - indeed if you see software as a virtual machine and GMOs as biotechnology than this is already happening.

Now all Ecosystems tend to have fragility; organic networks can also have fractal degree distributions with massive hub points which introduce the possibility of catastrophic tail events. Man made networks have had a tendency to be even more skewed distributions than other organic systems. So for me the intelligence of the technology is less relevant to its Virulence and its Evolutionary and Ecological impact on the Biosphere, Technosphere and Nusphere.

Is there such a thing as bias towards earlier options in a poll question?

The main problem with your argument is - the only technology that can replicate itself these days is biotech. This and the incredibly low (and exponentially dropping) prices of this technology are the real reasons we must be far more cautious with biotechnology than other technologies. Sooner will a nutjob create a superbug in a garage lab than he would create skynet.

....who thinks slander is a strange thing to ban legally? As a skeptic it seems both epistemically and pragmatically difficult to work with such laws, and I feel we should try and create unlegislated social pressure to help the truth float to the surface instead.

Sorry but that is some grade A B#!!$#!%. Some of the best ideas come in down time - procrastination is in fact a virtue. Giving yourself the space and time to read something outside your field, to do some sports, to dance and read poetry, have fun in whatever way you want - these are things that make you a better scholar. Being stressed 24/7 does not. I will avoid the rant about how a post like yours represents some of the things that are so screwed up about the current academic system.

Actually the 20-80 rule is much more widely applicable than sales alone. It reflects a certain fractal geometry in the distribution of many kinds of events. The name is a bit of a simplification - obviously often the distribution may be less or more extreme (like when 99.9% of all movement in a particular stock price occurs in 0.1% of the time it is traded).

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

Now - I can't cite a paper but a buddy of mine is an evolutionary psychologist who told me they estimate that in the ancestral environment, humans worked 3-4 hours a day. Max. The rest of the time was spent hanging around, eating or having sex. Such power law behavior seem to me to be present in several forms of human behavior - although to be fair this is pure speculation on my part.