"Ease of installation and integration,"? Please turn in your /. number and move on. There is no room for that or good appearances here. That shit might cost money and has no place on /.

Seriously? There is someone on /. that didn't know that OS X was a certified UNIX?

...everyone knows that the extermination of a species is only caused by human generated global warming – typically from the activities of people residing on the North American continent. So the story is obviously false.

I have no problem with shortcuts to reduce typing keystrokes. I was responding to what I thought was a vote for cryptic symbolic languages that are not easily readable. To me, those types of setups are just a waste of time.

Not true, at all. I started out with an Altair 8080 that I built. It was programmed by stepping through the memory location one at a a time and setting the byte stored there with paddle switches. When I got a TRS-80, I could type just fine and really liked creating code that I could show anyone how to read. Yes, you could substitute symbols, but why do it. If you knew how to type, then it was better for readable code.

Best fits *your* experience. Please do not assume that you know anyone else's experience.

Completely agree. Only use Access if it is the ONLY solution available to you – including not having access to paper and pencil. I've seen nothing but problems from systems that started out as just small solutions. They tend to grow over time and Access is a real pain in the back-side.

Wow. The "full experience" requires the use of Google apps? So much for open source and choice.

Yes, if you have the technical ability that /.'era are supposed to have, then you can root your phone, fork your own version of Android, yada, yada, yada. But Google would go broke if the only people using Android phones are /.'ers. So as more organizations move to fork Android for their own purposes, it will be interesting to see just how long it takes before Google pulls out of supporting it.

Consensus is not scientific fact. Period.

If I say that based on all available data that all geese are white and everyone agrees with me, but one black goose if found, my theory is bullshit. All your attempts to justify consensus is significant. Yes, there are supporting data points that support your point(s). Soyou've found a bunch of white geese. There are other scientists (including the ones that actually support your seeming perspective) that have data that conflicts with those points (black geese). The climate has too many variables and it is too wound up with politics for me believe either your perspective or the opposing one. Yes, either side since I've not concluded one way or the other based on the facts that I've been able to discern.

Just because someone is an "expert" and says something I do not check my brain at the door - that is a great way to be scammed. No thank you. So I also use my own evidence to weigh what I've heard. For example, with all the talk about melting ice caps and glaciers and the resulting rising sea levels, I should be able to see evidence in my own home, on the Gulf of Mexico. Yet, I see nothing. Unless there is a geologic rise on my beach that is exactly the same as the ocean level rise over the past forty years of my residence, there is no sea level rise. If all that ice is melting but the seas are not rising, then where is the water? Evian bottles? No. I conclude that either the ice melting is bullshit or it is being refrozen somewhere else. Either way, that seems to indicate that global warming is bullshit - consensus notwithstanding.

So...when the best minds of the world (scientists mind you) thought the world was flat and the consensus was exactly that, you'd be wrong. Consensus is not a fact, as you should know as a scientist. And even the best minds can be wrong. Witness Albert Einstein on entanglement.

While consensus may make you feel better to be part of a group, it is not a valid scientific argument - as you should know.

Ah, one of those are you. Yes, there are scientists on both sides, as well as politicians, and pro capital propaganda machines masquerading as *green* organizations.

As to scientific method, the very foundation of scientific method is skepticism. Scientists come up with a theory and then other scientists immediately try to poke holes in it. Yet, the climate change group immediately demonize anyone that points to the flaws rather than finding ways to get better data.

So...where is the warming that your scientists have been saying that we were supposed to have for the past 25 years when even their own data (the stuff they don't hide) shows at best the temperature holding steady and at worst (for them) growing a bit cooler? Yes. Yes. I know. The record blizzards and cooler temerpatures are the result of warming. Up is down. Red is blue, yada yada yada.

...since the "scientific results" change on a monthly basis, combined with the yearly releases on how the "scientists" are doctoring the data or selectively releasing on the portions that support the result that they want to show - debating is very, very easy. Add to that the other side where scientists are doing the same thing, but support the opposing view, and you get wonderful conflict.

If either side actually released the complete data, with nothing hidden and both sides actually focused on finding the truth about the climate, we *might* be able to actually determine what is going on and if there is anything we can do about it – or even if we should do anything about it. After all, who says that today's climate is the best one for the earth? There are have been very many climate changes in the earth's history. Why do we think we have the right to pick one?

However, since there are people/power/money involved, there will be very few real facts that matter. So, we are back to debate and the people that get paid to do it.

Yep, and it can be cheaper. It is not my problem if other countries choose to screw their citizens and control them with higher energy costs. That is a problem for them to solve. In the US, it is my problem. We are based on freedom (freedom that has been and continues to be seriously eroded) and using taxes to control us is unacceptable to me and to a very large and growing segment of our population.

Striving to keep the cost of fossil fuel down? You must be kidding - or living in a place where they allow for local extraction of fuel and without the taxes on all aspects of the extraction to delivery process. So...you must not be living in the US.

Hey! Get your facts straight. The sun has nothing to do with global warming. ;-)