Daily Kos is biased too, but as a rule their writers are much much better informed.

They even have an article on Examples of Bias in Wikipedia to prove it. It's their 9th most viewed page. Because proof for Conservapedia whatever they pull out of their asses.

Their second most viewed page is THE HOMOSEXUAL AGENDA. See the full list. It's unusual that only one of their top ten is about homosexuality. In the past as many as seven of the top ten most viewed pages have been about it.

Actually no. I figured out that smart people are harder to treat for emotional disorders long long before I knew anything about AGW. And I had a fear of flying long before 9/11. Anyway, I don't think stupid people like being teabagged by arrogant TSA agents either. A dog knows when it's being treated badly.

Smarter people are better at justifying their own ignorance. Unless they have critical thinking skills they are better able to cherry pick and fit whatever information they find to support their views rather than derive their views from the big picture. I've met some very smart people who believe weird shit. I myself know that flying commercially is safe, but the monkey in brain is going we're all going to die! and mull over a million different ways a plane could crash.

Anyway, skimming the paper lends neither support for nor contradicts the evidence that humans have caused and are causing the climate to change. It only addresses the likely belief systems of people in their peer groups and how that information can be used to communicate effectively with those groups:

For the ordinary individual, the most consequential effect of his beliefs about climate change is likely to be on his relations with his peers. A hierarchical individualist who expresses anxiety about climate change might well be shunned by his co-workers at an oil refinery in Oklahoma City. A similar fate will probably befall the egalitarian communitarian English professor who reveals to colleagues in Boston that she thinks the scientific consensus on climate change is a hoax.

Short answer. Science fiction you see on televisions is called Sci-Fi because it is less rigorous than written science fiction. Star Trek and Serenity are Sci-Fi. The Mote in God's Eye and A Canticle for Liebowitz are science fiction.

NOT a sci-fi writer.

Anyway, I listened to the piece. At the end she said it would work in fiction. They do discuss the downside of chipping everyone. I guess the question is, do the benefits outweigh the risks? There are benefits, but the dangers posed by chipping are far greater. There would be no anonymity for the most powerful and spies. The apparatus of power would want the 99% chipped, but not themselves, the 1%. We already live in a police state. If your name gets put on a no fly list, you are screwed. There is no appeal even when the government fucks up. The technology is getting so we don't need to be chipped.

If you know anything about Elizabeth and her politics she is anything but a totalitarian. But as usual slashdot distorts and commenters blather on what they know jack shit about.

If they get enough people like Massie in the Tea Party, they might bring up the average IQ into triple digits.

I was so hoping Ron Paul would cause Mitt Romney as much trouble as Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum combined.

for building futuristic looking fort dioramas.

head into the bed of each member of the patent mafia. Just license the technology and I'll make them an offer they can't refuse.

And yes there are places you can take your burned out CFLs to dispose of the mercury in them safely. The CFLs are supposed to last 5-7 years, and I'm sure by that time (assuming civilization hasn't collapsed to Mad Max scenario) LEDs will have come down in price.

the shit by posting this article. What are you a sophomore high school tabloid? Why, yes. As a matter of fact you are.

It's the reason I get up in the afternoon.

But it is "security theater."

Charlie Stross has some interesting things to say about this Olympics 2012: A Bruce Schneier Moment:

Lunacy on stilts. (Oh, and let me add, the residents don't get any choice over having missiles billeted on top of their homes.)

If one of those things is ever fired, either in anger or by accident, it'll shower white-hot supersonic shrapnel across the extremely crowded residential heart of a city.