Yes, let's not get partisan about the very partisan thing someone did. I mean, even though Democrats controlled the NC legislature for a century before the 2006 elections and the maps weren't particularly gerrymandered then.
br> "Both sides do it" is what cowards say when their side gets caught doing something.

Because to understand how to best fix a problem, you generally have to know what causes it. For instance, if it wasn't man-made, you have to come up with crazy expensive geoengineering projects. If not, hey, maybe installing a bunch more solar panels and wind turbines would help. Your argument is just deflection from your own ignorance. Also, you suck at troubleshooting.

That's idiotic. Inflation is normal in a healthy economy. It's just that historically, both pay and prices have increased in tandem. During the Regan administration that changed, and wages started to lag, but lately that divergence has been accelerating. Inflation is still happening, but wages are stagnant. The issue isn't inflation - again, a little bit is normal and healthy - but lack of wage inflation.

Yes. RTFA.

Really? So, Anonymous Coward knows better than NASA and NOAA and the UN Panel on Cliamate Change? Oh, wait, maybe you don't have any f-ing clue what you're talking about, and the effects of Man-made climate change are radically different than natural variation.

Here's the thing, as you post on Slashdot, I'm going to assume you troubleshoot problems. Maybe it's network infrastructure, maybe it's software, maybe it's server administration. I don't know. But, do you really consider a problem "fixed" if you don't know the cause? If errors are getting thrown everywhere, do you apply band-aid fixes that "seem to work" but you don't know why? I do know those guys. You know what? They're fucking terrible at their jobs. Real troubleshooting is learning the root cause and fixing it. Even if you can't fix the root error directly, if you don't have a real understanding of it, you never know if your band-aids are gong to work.

When someone says "well who cares if it's man-made" or "it's really the alarmists that are the problem" or whatever, it's just another attempt to sow doubt on a model that is just as predictive as Evolution. It matters what caused it, because that influences how you fix it - for instance, if it's man-made, moving off coal power plants to solar, nuclear, wind, etc, is a huge help. So get a clue, stop sticking your head in the sand and changing the subject, and realize that man-made climate change is radically different than natural variation. Idiot.

Don't forget ideology. Get ready to read a bunch of posts from people who pride themselves on being scientific, but reject a theory that enjoys more support in climatology than the Standard Model does in physics. Just because they're conservative and it would be inconvenient for their politics.

The thing about those kind of stereotypes is, just as TFA mentioned, women absorb them too. "Women are bad at math." "Women are catty with each other." And so on. When a woman buys into them, yet don't she doesn't see herself this way, she may consciously or unconsciously seeks to set herself apart and say "I'm not like other women!"

Then they become the person that a sexist guy cites as his "female friend" that backs up his sexist theories that get perpetuated to the next generation.

I completely agree, except the part where you said she wouldn't get quite as many accolades. She wrote the first compiler. That's fucking seminal! Who else can claim a first that big?

Oh my God, your friend says he got yelled at one time by an IRS agent for deducting something he shouldn't have, and then completely ignored the IRS and still didn't pay it? WHAT MONSTERS.

I don't think I understand your point. How is anybody being denied "academic freedom?" Who is stopping these PhDs from studying whatever they want? Or by academic freedom do you mean "the freedom to make somebody else pay them for their studies?"

This isn't a dig, I really feel like I'm missing a piece of the puzzle because I just don't get the outrage, particularly with this statement: "The idea of academic freedom being available only to those who have already made their most significant contribution (and therefore get tenure which is supposed to provide academic freedom) is an idea that needs to be discussed. It is a problem." If I only have a small pool of money to pay tenured professors, why wouldn't I want to select the ones that have proven themselves?

This is generally done by the same people who use the term "elites" derisively. There's a culture - often promulgated by Libertarians - that people who aren't directly enhancing some corporation's bottom line somewhere don't deserve recognition or respect. The fact is, someone who has made significant contributions to their field deserves some job security.

It's not that these naysayers have a better system for who deserves tenure (or, if they want to eliminate tenure altogether, a tenure-like protection from Administrative whims). They don't want anyone to have such protections, because then scientists who tell inconvenient truths about politics or science ("Hey, did you know Climate Change might be a problem?) can be easily silenced by politically or corporate-backed powers.

Is the tenure system perfect? God, no, but what system involving human pecking order is? But it's pretty good, actually, for the most part! They're a reason the western-style educational system has been rocking it hardcore for hundreds of years now. And the fact is, the attack on professors, tenure, and the scientific elites in general is mostly coming from the corners that are trying to tear down science as an edifice in general.

There are many career paths, such as professional sports or marketers. But let's use a really inflammatory example to belittle higher education yet again.

There's a difference between being wrong, and people thinking something is wrong. For instance, it doesn't matter how many people think Global Warming is a hoax - they're wrong.

Similarly, it doesn't matter if a billion customers think Taiwan is part of China. The real objective truth is Taiwan operates independently. The clue might be that the Taiwan Government is the one complaining.

On Android, I have a lockscreen widget and the camera app is accessible without unlocking.

Scalzi actually does fairly hard sci-fi mostly. Check his Old Man's War novels. They're good.

Yes, obviously, one company should own a trademark on any product containing the work "Sky" in it.