from a relative n00b - can netsukuku or something similar get us out of this?

http://www.netsukuku.org/?pag=about

Agree completely. I just walked into BofA today and closed my account. Went online and did paypal too. Felt amazingly good. Just hope ING continues not to suck, as they are my only bank now...

here's a hint: log(1) = 0. So it's the same size, which is why no one with a brain says "it's one time thinner".

how bad is it that my first thought was "Cool!" ... I'm astronomer, I've been waiting to be relevant to the safety of humanity for a while...

I'm under no illusion that I'm invincible. I've already had (most likely) the H1N1 as they're reporting 99% of the recent flu cases were in my area of Texas (I was very mildly ill after caring for a relative with it). But obviously I meant that I'm very unlikely to die from the regular flu. The H1N1 is another matter - my boyfriend saw many previously healthy people in their 20s die while he worked at the hospital here last month.

This is not necessarily surprising or a new idea. A researcher at Rice University (Michael Deem, whom I have heard speak on this) studies the genetic basis for the vaccine and the resulting efficacy in any given year and there are MANY years in which getting a flu vaccine the previous year will actually increase your chances of getting the flu the next, or make it worse. You can find an interesting calculator here: http://www.mwdeem.rice.edu/pepitope/, where there is also a link to his most important paper on it at the bottom (no registration req.). Here is an excerpt:

Vaccine efficacy can even be negative, however, due to original antigenic sin [7-9], the tendency for antibodies produced in response to exposure to infl uenza vaccine antigens to suppress the creation of new, different antibodies in response to exposure to new versions of the infl uenza virus. The efficacy of the annual in fluenza vaccine, and whether original antigenic sin may occur, depends sensitively on how similar the vaccine and circulating viral strains are. Current state of the art measures of antigenic distance are based on ferret antisera hemagglutinin inhibition assays [10-12], and these distances are assumed to correlate well with vaccine efficacies in humans. However, to our knowledge no such good correlation has ever been shown for an experimental or theoretical measure of antigenic distance.

Ever since I heard this talk, and learned that the flu vaccine is actually a random guess each year, I don't bother with it. I'm young, strong, and tough and very very unlikely to die, I figure.

Funny, I expected that line to go like...

The idea that every person who is reporting/informing/pushing/(whatever spin you like) the idea of global warming is secretly involved in a plan to profit once the entire public is convinced of it's veracity, either independently or through a broad conspiracy is naive

... or CRAZY.