Another straw man about Capitalism, the one about how it's only price that matters. Quality and other factors are integral to Capitalism. If your bread is of such quality that the other bread seems "terrible" in comparison and yours only cost $.05 more (in 2012 US dollars) then your bread will sell very well. The exception would be commoditized products wherein price is the prime determinant. But to be commoditized the quality has to be indistinguishable so your example doesn't work there either.

More importantly, however, is that the only alternative yet presented to "the invisible hand" is some bureaucrat(s) deciding for us. If I prefer to eat the terrible bread and spend the saved money on something else who's this guy to tell me I should prefer the other bread? Don't get me wrong, Capitalism stinks. It just stinks less than every other system implemented to date.

That's only how straw man capitalism works, not real world capitalism. In real world capitalism if bread made with honey were actually a superior product then although the CEO of an entrenched bread company might not want to produce it a CEO of an upstart would realize she could raise her pay by producing and selling it thus gaining market share, enriching her investors and leaving the entrenched bread company in the dust.

Of course, in "capitalism" as practiced by the US right now the entrenched bread company would get the government to pass some regulation that seemed reasonable but that was actually designed to hamper the competition. Perhaps new labeling or packaging requirements that, due to scaling effects, would impose much higher costs per unit on small producers.

It most certainly does. Feel free to show a citation to the contrary.

For 0 to 4 degrees C it contracts but warmer than that it expands. Water Physics_and_chemistry

So life on other planets is dependent on our knowledge? Sounds doubtful. It may increase our reason to believe that such life is possible, but not whether that life actual exists/existed.

Here

Perhaps, but you have to infer that, it is NOT contained in the graph. In other words, it might support an argument for anthropogenic global warming but it does nothing to refute my claim that the graph that was supposed to be "in context" certainly wasn't.

That's pretty poor context. That graph is pure distortion. It's has the time from 1870 to now at one scale and the rest in thousands of years. Moreover, it clearly shows that temperatures have been rising for years before civilization was around and is now at the high point.

Since we are all pretty well aware that we are between ice ages it doesn't say much at all and it gives absolutely no indication if the current warming trend is usual or not.

My problem is that it'll be those in authority deciding what is "hate-filled bullshit" and, as has happened again and again in history, ultimately the definition will be "anything that is a threat to my power". Don't forget, "Democracy" was also a "dangerous idea" to governments, especially in 19th century Europe.

Ultimately, while the "will of the people" worries me at times, I'd much rather people be able to express their opinions, even ones I don't favor, than trust the government (or University, or other authority) as to what I can and can not say.

It's not just "angry conservative type opinions" but ALL opinions are potentially affected by this form of confirmation bias. Left wing, right wing, social conventions, even food preferences. Here's an excellent book on the subject.

Not to mention decades of atomic testing at Bikini and other pacific islands.

I won't argue what "campus" means but, the bill never mentions "campus". here' the text of the bill:

Senate Bill 367 (P.N. 2349) – This bill establishes the Indigenous Mineral Resource Development Act, allowing the Department of General Services to make and execute contracts or leases for the mining or removal of coal, oil, natural gas, coal bed methane and limestone found in or beneath land owned by the state or state system of higher education.

In other words, the article from Mother Jones was entirely misleading making people think of gas rigs next to dormitories when, in reality, the bill opened up all state lands pending government approval. Typical Mother Jones scare tactics.

The Templeton Foundation that funded this research is often highly criticized for religious bias. It's kind of like oil companies providing money for research. It might be good in that it provides research funding but there's always a worry that the money from an organization with a particular point of view might skew the science.

I'm not saying that this invalidates the research, but it does cast some doubt on it and the reasons it is being done.

It meant abandoning all my mods on this story but this intrigued me and I had to look up it up. In fact, while the number of smokers may have dropped the TAX REVENUES from smokers has been increasing steadily and at pace far faster than inflation. I think that lends some good evidence to sls1j's assertion that taxing pollution will lead to government dependence on that taxation. Obviously smoking and pollution aren't exactly the same but I think there's a good point made there.

There was a MUCH stronger association between employment and fracking sites.