Freeman Dyson is not a climatologist, and should not be expected to understand it. He also has a strong contrarian streak, and will oppose almost any viewpoint that he perceives as a consensus. He is not a denier, he is a skeptic. But he is a skeptic of pretty much everything.

"This is being uploaded live". And make it so.

The reason why Linux eclipsed Minix is obvious, since Minix was never more than an educational tool. But why did Linux triumph over BSD? In the early 1990s, FreeBSD was considerably better, more stable, and had a more liberal license. Here are my theories:

1. FreeBSD required a hardware FPU, at a time when many computers didn't have them.
2. The AT&T lawsuit put a lot of uncertainty over BSD.
3. The user communities were very different. Linux users were very open and helpful to newbies. BSD forums were hostile to anyone that didn't already know everything.

Germany does not have single payer healthcare. They have a multi-payer system where the costs are shared by government, employer, and individual.

I once got sick on a business trip in Germany. There was a nurse screening patients. The nurse could see that I had a standard bug that was going around, and gave me some pills. I never saw a doctor. This actually seems like a good system, and using nurses to handle the obvious 90%, while doctors focus on the 10%, certainly holds down costs. But I don't think you can just "show up" and see a GP. At least that wasn't how it worked for me.

Agreed. But so far our "reforms" have focused on coverage rather than cost. If we fix the costs, then fixing the coverage will be far easier. Germany's system seemed quite good. I have also used Canada's system, and that was good too.

Well, these allegations just don't pass the common sense test. Almost any organization is going to have at least 5% annual attrition, and many organizations have far higher rates. So out of 1028 employees, about 200 would be expected to leave during the 4 year period covered. Yet they expect us to believe that the actual attrition was ZERO? Somebody is either mangling the statistics, or outright lying.

You are lucky he would even tell you. Most places won't give you an answer on how much treatment will cost. You're lucky if you can force out of them some sort of paper before you leave that describes what treatment was given on what date. They don't want you to have any information because that will bite them a month later when they send you a bill for Sasquatch infection testing and you contest it. I hate going to the doctor's office because I rarely get diagnosis that I couldn't come up with myself, it's usually to get a prescription. Oh you're vomitting? Hmm, let me poke you in the stomach a few times... Yeah, not sure why, take some of these pills to make you stop vomiting. Have a nice day! Nothing to pay today, we'll send you a bill.

Next day, go to the pharmacy to pick up prescription for $70 pills to make you stop vomiting even though you feel better today. Might as well save them for later.

Next month, receive bill for $297.35 with a single line item that says "Doctor services"

No thanks, for $370 bucks, I'll keep vomiting until I get better or die thank you.

This is the number one issue with healthcare. The health insurance company doesn't give two shits about you. You are not their customer. If you are lucky they comply with the law. If you are not, they skirt the law and hope you'll give up after 3 or 4 rounds of appeals. Complaining to HR about insurance is a nice way to get your name on a list. Companies provide the shittiest health insurance they can still hire employees with. I had to drop my wife from my company health insurance plan and pay extra for private insurance because the company insurance covered NOTHING. And I mean nothing to the point where every time I go to the pharmacy they question it because NO ONE pays full retail price for this shit.

This is one of the biggest bullshit issues with the system. Why is a simple prescription $550 "retail" but the negotiated insurance rate is 1/5 of that? It's like they are trying to screw over people who have to pay out of pocket.

When you go to the urgent care they ask questions that shouldn't be relevant like "how close are you to your deductible?" That just tells them how much shit to tack on the bill to try to get away with before insurance decides they are only paying 40% of the bill anyway. Somewhere in there doctors' offices are claiming fraudulent "losses" and insurance companies are inflating their "value." At the end, it's the consumer getting a walletbotomy.

That is not how socialized medicine works. You can't just go to the doctor whenever you feel like it. Single payer healthcare reduces costs, and people with SPH are generally happier with their care, but there are tradeoffs. Long waiting lists for many ailments, and reduced patient choice, are among those tradeoffs.

The whole of the USA has turned into a gigantic SPE.

Some people used to think that some of them were idiots., on occasion.

With this bylaw we know for sure that all of them are assholes and idiots, all the time.

I fully expect that people in the USA are going to follow their own mistakes. If the recent attack in Texas had succeeded in causing mass casualties, it would be the government's excuse for new gun control measures.

I've been saying for years that it was only a matter of time before a Charlie Hebdo or Mumbai style attack happened on U.S. soil with legally purchased firearms. Then, the gun grabbers will be out in force trying to limit access to firearms in the name of "safety". It's happening now, but the failure of the attack will prevent the gun control effort from gathering momentum.

The American people gave up Amendments 4,5 and 6 of the Bill of Rights after 9-11. Will they allow themselves to be deprived of #2 after an attack involving firearms?

Too bad it was a traffic cops and not a private citizen who thwarted the attack in Texas. Still, it proves that a good guy with a gun can prevent or mitigate mass murder.

It's completely in accordance with Smith v. Maryland, which is the controlling law. Smith v. Maryland involved one tap on one person's phone; it's been used to cover the NSA bulk metadata collection program, thus proving the slippery slope is not a fallacy.

It'll take the robed 9 to overturn it, but they likely won't.