Eugenics (\yü-je-niks\) is the bio-social movement which advocates practices to improve the genetic composition of a population, usually a human population.
Eugenics needn't be about the NBA or eye color. Down syndrome tests and abortions have cleansed future generations of a particular kind of people. People who are typically gentle, loving and incapable of lying.

The happiest days of your life. Surely you don't believe you have the only valid kind of happiness?

What about the 1 chance in 80 of giving birth to a child with autistic spectrum disorder or 1 chance in 25 of giving birth to a child with bipolar disorder? Both of these conditions can be a more severe disability than DS But as there is no accurate per-natal test for these, wouldn't sterilization be the sensible thing be to do... for everyone?

Have you ever met anyone with Down Syndrome or Mosaic Down Syndrome? Are you really saying that allowing them to live is comparable to experimenting on Jews in concentration camps? This is the sad thing about the fact that Americans have virtually cleansed future generations of a kind of person who someone decided is undesirable. Too few of these people and their loved ones are here to correct your generation's terribly negative assumptions about the value of their human lives. Yes, Down syndrome is a burden but any parent who isn't prepared to care for a child for at least 1/3rd of their lives should not have children of any sort. There are a number of disorders which are much more of a burden. In my neighborhood there are several people with Down syndrome, two of my friends were born blind as were other, another was born with MD and countless other friends have a disposition to bipolar disorders. These good people are able to think, create, love and enjoy their lives which in many cases are more independent and just as as the lives of others.

A virus-delivered multicell cure for single-gene disorders is a real possiblity given experiments with colorblindness. We should celebrate this, but I shudder to think of a world where a 1 chance in 40 of a disorder causes us to ignore the humanity of the person with the disorder.

I'm glad I used the political wordplay "newspeak" mirror image of anti-choice because it obviously made you think.

Would 100% certainty that an unborn child would have Down Syndrome be enough to justify an abortion? That is a decision I'm thankful I haven't had to make. My answer is no and while I respect another's ability to make this decision, you won't stop me from trying to make it an informed decision.

Yes I deliberately used a term that was just as charged as the common "anti-choice" term that you've heard so much on news media and in pop political-culture, you're immune to the fact that it's an equally charged term.

The phrase "Pro Choice" is not descriptive. (Pro choice about what? iPod vs Android, Republican vs Democrat?, Beans vs Carrots?) Nor does the phrase "Pro Choice" accurately describe the plight of women in places where abortion is not only permissible, it is mandatory. It also ignores the fact that there are pro-abortion individuals (abusive boyfriends/husbands/parents) who are decidedly against giving a woman the choice to let her unborn child live.

See my OP. No the neuchal ultrasound evaluation is not particularly reliable. Combined with a maternal blood test it becomes somewhat more reliable but anyone who would use either of these to justify life/death decisions is an idiot, whatever their eugenic good intentions are. Even if these tests were 100% accurate, we have the problem of medical incompetence. A nurse read our son's neuchal/blood test results of 1/40 (2.5%) chance of Down Syndrome and presented it as a 40% chance. This nurse previously worked in well respected Boston hospital and heaven knows how many aborted babies were the result of her mathematical illiteracy. Thankfully the country where she now works (Ireland) doesn't allow abortion for eugenics as the US does.

Since we're talking statistics, amniocentesis, the invasive test for Down Syndrome, has a 0.75% chance of ending the pregnancy so we opted for a lower risk combination of an ultrasound scan and blood test. The results (along with our age and other factors) gave a 1 in 40 (2.5%) chance of a baby with Down Syndrome. But the nurse who read the results to us didn't say once chance in 40 and she didn't say 2.5% chance. She said 40% chance! (Is mathematic literacy a medical training requirement.) Fortunately we did the tests merely to inform ourselves of what special preparation we might need to make. Abortion for eugenic purposes is not legal here in Ireland as it is in the US. Unfortunately this same nurse trained in Boston. Heaven only knows how many pregnancies were ended based on this. We're thankful for a healthy little boy who doesn't have Down Syndrome but we may all owe a debt of gratitude to people with Down Syndrome. Studying the characteristics of this syndrome may help us understand Alzheimers and studying the fact that cancer is much rarer in people Down Syndrome may help us understand and cure this terrible disease.

The take no prisoners battle between the anti-life and anti-choice people have left us in a state of anti-science, anti-compassion and anti-love.

Yes, and IBM and Apple and Google... US tax, SEC and patent law as well as Fed/Obama helicopter drops assures that Goliath companies grow by absorbing smaller companies, not by innovation. And the overhead of a Goliath company assures that anything that doesn't add half a billion or more to the balance sheet will be killed. The good news is that this leaves huge holes in the market which can be filled by smaller companies. Sun Ray has been around for more than a decade and if you've seen it in action, you might wonder whether like so many other computer technologies, it was ahead of its time. For a decade it has been ready to save millions of dollars in energy and IT support costs and it would be a perfect fit healthcare, education, government and many corporate uses. Lets hope that bad corporate decisions and bad government policy are not enough to bury a good idea forever.

Too many years in sciences, I read Nina's last known position as decimal. I think the alert was in DD-MM so -33 Degrees, 50 minutes and 169 degrees 41 minutes which is -33.8333 169.68333. It also isn't as far south as in that photobucket image I posted earlier, but is very near the center of this MODIS image for June 4th. If you go to this website you can zoom in and out and change the date and be amazed at how rapidly this low forms a circular storm and moves east leaving a whispy trail of high-wind clouds. The best resolution MODIS imagery is around 250mm so little chance of seeing a boat but NASA/NOAA night imagery might be able to pick up ship lights if they are particularly bright.

Enhanced satellite image with last known position of the Nina on June 4, 2013. (Arrow drawn to approximate position.)

I just noticed the date of the Pan-Pan alert. I wonder if the standard for PanPan broadcasts is Zulu time or local time and if so, what locale? Anyway by midnight June 4th Z, the storm was right over them and then sending them south should have reduced their time in the storm but it would have risked giving them a fierce headwind and driving them back to New Zealand if they were disabled.

Posted on the cruisers forum:

Current from Australia Maritime Safety Information current at 300000 UTC JUN 13 Issued by the Australian Maritime Safety Authority Rescue Coordination Centre (RCC Australia) Part 1. Distress, Urgency, CQ and Safety Messages: PAN PAN FM RCC AUSTRALIA 260143Z JUN 2013 AUSSAR 2013/4000 TASMAN SEA RCC AUSTRALIA REQUESTS INFORMATION REGARDING SIGHTINGS OR COMMUNICATIONS WITH THE WHITE AND GREEN 60FT SCHOONER RIGGED VESESL 'NINA'. THE VESSEL HAS 7 POB, AND WAS ON A VOYAGE FROM OPUA NEW ZEALAND TO NEWCASTLE AUSTRALIA, LAST KNOWN POSITION 33-50S 169-41E 04 JUNE 2013. REPORTS TO THIS STATION OR RCC AUSTRALIA VIA TELEPHONE +61262306811 INMARSAT THROUGH LES BURUM (POR 212,IOR 312), SPECIAL ACCESS CODE (SAC) 39, HF DSC 005030001, EMAIL: rccaus@amsa.gov.au OR BY FAX +61262306868. NNNN

So this is why they're still looking in NZ. Last known position was north of the center of the storm which means she would have been initially blown east if she'd been dis-masted or her crew was otherwise set adrift on June 3-4th. One thing I don't understand is given this position, why would they have been guided to sail south, towards the center of the storm in order to "get out of this nasty weather"?

Notice that they aren't too far from an intense white spot (thunderhead?) in this photo. Could they have been guided from inside a relatively localized thunderstorm towards the eye of the storm?

Good thread. If someone Evi loved and respected were lost at sea, she might want to help organize a crowdsourced search and rescue effort like the one used in search of Jim Gray, Tyler Wright and Steve Fosset. What we need is data. As someone who has sailed for decades, I won't underestimate the scope of the effort. VHF radio doesn't reach much beyond the horizon and a mast of a ship that size wouldn't be seen or return a RADAR reflection more than about 7 miles under ideal conditions. So if EPIRB, HF and Satellite are down, the ship only has a 6 or 7 mile radius of observability, less if it has been dis-masted. (Somewhat likely given the conditions.) But the Tasman sea is huge so we need to use data to focus the search effort. The coast guard has a protocol which does this, based on tidal and weather patterns. But we can extend this based on the particular kind of boat, how well it sails into the wind, how fast it is, the captain and crew's behavior and the recommendations to go south of a low on June 3rd, 2013. Apparently GPS coordinates weren't part of Evi's last broadcast. But we can take the same reasonable assumption that I've see rescue people speak of, that they were in th center of the storm. Here is a weather satellite photo of the area on June 3rd. The storm seemed strongest at about 38S 165E. If they were in the thick of it by June 3rd, they were already pulled south of the rhumb-line to their destination, they might have drifted or been forced even further south. The storm grew stronger for at least another day as it moved east on June 4th. If they were ahead of (West of) the storm, they were almost certainly pushed north and west because lows circulate clockwise in the southern hemisphere. If they were behind it they may have been pushed south but I think this is less likely since they should have been already pretty far from NZ and the storm was moving east as they were moving west. Here are the weather satellite photos for the rest of June. But what we need are high resolution satellite or aircraft photos. Unfortunately this part of the world at this time of year is covered in clouds much of the time. Even the recon mission photos might not show much. So like the guy who looks for his keys under the streetlight, we might be limited in where we can crowdsource search. If someone were really industrious, they'd send out drones or balloons equipped with high resolution cameras. It's still a needle in a haystack, but its something. And if it helps bring these people home, it's worth it. If you ever want to read a harrowing story about someone lost at sea, only a few dozen miles from shore in the relatively tiny Irish sea, read the story of Fastnet 79, "Left for Dead." Evi, we're not giving up on you or the rest of the crew so keep hopeful and focus on yours and your friend's survival.

Surely Mortgage Investors Corporation pulled in far more than $7.5 Million with this fraud. And they certainly caused more than $7.5 Million in damages to their victims and the rest society by blowing phone spam into the property bubble. What's to stop them or anyone else from doing it again? This should have been a criminal case. Prison for the CEO and board of directors would be more of a deterrent for corporate crimes.

If you're following the news about Google Glass, you'll have heard that some people hate having their picture taken. This is a fact that nearly every photojournalist has to deal with. Only those who've been in the industry a very long time will be able to blend into the background and capture the scene without becoming themselves a reality-distorting distraction. The best will do this without disturbing the relationship and trust the reporter must build with the people being interviewed. They might even become "the bad cop" (does anyone remember The Animal from Lou Grant? That jerk photographer that both the interviewee and reporter can share a laugh and a beer with while the reporter builds her story.

Give the reporter an iPhone or DSLR or Google Glass and the reporter becomes that jerk photographer. The relationship between reporter and interviewee disappears as quickly as you can say, "So-long Chicago Sun-Times."

AP (Chicago transcript by Siri): President Obama's state of the unit address was... I'd rather not say. But the corndog mafia sentopolis and will in the Mideast. I don't know. Maybe the genius bar guys could answer that. But North Korean leader... I'm not allowed to delete reminders. Look... a puppy!

We'll see when Telsa (or anyone else) can beat Better Place's distance record of 1172 miles in 24 hours. When Telsa figures out another way to push 22KW into a car in 3 minutes without causing a huge explosion and fire, than we'll have a better idea. Until then, Better Place's technology was the most practical form of electric transport using existing technology. It was a good idea but like many good ideas, it needs to wait until society is ready for it and entrepreneurs know how to sell it. This is by no means the first time we've seen technological regression. The rechargeable battery electric car was invented by French physicist Gaston Planté in 1856. In 1878, a Methodist minister named John Wesley Carhart proved that a steam-powered car he named the “Spark” could travel long distances under its own power. But when it frightened a valuable horse belonging to industrialist J.I. Case (tractor company owner) to death, it was banished from the city and the world would have to wait until 1886 when Karl Benz and then later Henry Ford would bring back an idea whose time had finally come.
Similar examples of technological regressions and reinventions can be found in the history of electric lighting. Better Place had a better idea for electric car charging, and if we can learn anything from history– most good ideas eventually see the light of day.